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LARGE  REDUCTION  IN  PRICE. 


All  our  books  hitherto  listed  at  $2.00  per  vol. 
are  now  reduced  to  $1.50  per  vol. 

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SIGMA  PUBLISHING  CO. 


Social  Institutions 


In  their  Origin,  Growth,  and  Interconnection, 
Psychologically   Treated. 


BY 

DENTON   J.  SNIDER,  Litt.  D. 


\ 

SIGMA  PUBLISHING  CO., 

St.  Louis,  Mo.,  210  Pine  St. 

(Tor  Sale  by  A.  C  M'Clurg  &  Co.,  Booksellers,  Chicago,  Ills.) 


Copyright,  by 
!>.  J.  SNIDER,  1901. 


NIXON-JONES  PTG.  CO.,   2r5   PINE  ST.,  ST.  LOUIS. 


HM51 


Table  of  Contents. 


PAGE. 

^'     Introduction 5-43 

5,  SECTION  FIEST. 

The  Secular  Institution 44 


CHAPTEB  FIB  ST. 

The  Family 59 

CHAPTER  SECOND. 

Society        164 

CHAPTER   THIRD. 

The  State        33(3 


317142 


i  CONTENTS. 

SECTION  SECOND. 

The  Religious  Institution       .     .     .     .     349 

I.  The  Positive  Religious  Institu- 
tion        367 

II.  The  Negative  Religious    Insti- 
tution         408 

III.  The  Evolution  of  the  Religious 

Institution 426      ' 

SECTION  THIRD. 
The  Educative  Institution      ....     493 

GHAPTEB  FIRST. 

The  Public  School 504 

GHAPTEB  SECOND. 

The  Special  School 513 

chapter  third. 

The  Universal  School.     .     .     .     .     521 


IJSfTR  OD  UC  TION. 

The  title  page  of  the  present  work  endeavors 
to  suggest  its  purpose,  which  we  may  here  ehxbo- 
rate  a  little.  To  set  forth  the  origin,  growth, 
and  inter-connection  of  Social  Institutions  is  the 
design ;  we  shall  place  the  stress  upon  their  inter- 
connection. These  Institutions  are,  in  general, 
the  Family,  Society,  State,  Church,  and  the 
Educative  Institution,  all  of  which  are  to  be 
unfolded,  ordered,  and  shown  in  their  unity. 

As  the  chief  interest  is  to  see  how  these  Insti- 
tutions are  connected  and  correlated,  we  shall 
have  to  pay  special  attention  to  the  method. 
This  requires  a  certain  order  which  runs  through 
and  joins  together  the  whole  book ;  it  also  re- 
quires a  given  nomenclature  which  indicates  in  the 
word  the  connecting  thought.     Still  we  h(^pe  to 


6  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

render  the  following  exposition  intelligible  to  any 
reader  who  is  willing  to  think  a  little.  It  is  iui- 
l^ossible  to  unify  the  science  without  some  use 
of  technical  terms,  which,  however,  we  shall  try 
to  make  plain  either  in  advance  or  when  the  need 
for  them  arises.  But  all  cannot  be  grasped  at 
once;  the  thought  may  have  to  grow  a  while. 

It  ought  to  be  here  stated  that  the  term  8oci- 
ologij,  w^hich  may  seem  to  many  the  natural  desig- 
nation of  the  present  subject,  has  been  on  the 
whole  avoided.  For  this  there  are  several  rea- 
sons. Sociology  has  hitherto  derived  its  method 
from  Physical  Science,  largely  from  Biology ; 
our  method  comes  from  the  opposite  direction, 
from  Psvchology.  Moreover,  the  great  promot- 
ers of  Sociology  have,  in  the  main,  discarded 
Free-Will,  Herbert  Spencer  for  instance  declaring 
it  to  be  "an  illusion."  But  the  present  book 
makes  all  Institutions,  Society  included,  spring 
from  Free-Will ;  our  .science  is,  or  seeks  to  be,  a 
philosophy  of  freedom  in  its  total  circuit.  Then 
again  Sociology  is  usually  confined  to  Society  as 
such,  or  the  Economic  Order;  we  intend  to  em- 
brace in  our  work  the  whole  institutional  world. 
So  the  word  Sociologij  would  call  up  a  wrong  set 
of  mental  associations,  quite  antagonistic  to  our 
l)urpose;  we  shall  have  to  set  it  aside  in  the 
present  exposition.  We  might  call  the  science 
TnnHtutionologij,  were  the  word  not  too  outrage- 
ous, being  both  a   hybrid   and  a  vc oquf[AMJtjli<wi s 


INTBODUCTION.  7 

We  shall,  accordingly,  help  ourselves  out  with 
the  term,  Science  of  Institutions;  or,  when  wc 
may  wish  to  put  stress  upon  the  psychical  origin 
and  movement  of  our  subject,  we  shall  call  it 
Iiistitutional  Psychology.  For  if  Psychology  be 
the  determining  principle  of  Institutions,  as  is 
here  maintained,  then  they  become  a  branch  of 
the  general  science  of  Psychology. 

I.  The  statement  has  just  been  made  that  our 
treatment  of  institutional  science  goes  back  to 
Psychology  for  its  derivation  and  its  method. 
At  once  the  question  will  be  asked :  What  Psy- 
chology do  3'ou  mean?  as  there  are  several  sorts 
of  Psychology,  Let  the  answer  be  given  with  de- 
cision: not  the  old  Eational  Psychology,  nor  the 
more  recent  Physiological  Psychology,  both  of 
which,  having  performed  their  service,  have  re- 
tired or  are  retirino-  into  the  backoround,  where 
they  still  have  a  mission.  Both  have  shown  their 
limits ;  the  former.  Rational  Psychology,  had 
always  the  habit  of  imposing  upon  the  free  move- 
ment of  the  Self  some  alien  mctaphj-sical  S3^s- 
teni ;  the  latter,  Physiological  Psychology,  has 
committed  the  same  fault,  though  in  just  the 
opposite  manner:  it  has  foisted  its  method,  de- 
rived from  Natural  Science,  upon  the  free  move- 
ment of  the  Self,  the  Ego.  Both,  therefore,  are 
psychological  tyrants  in  the  very  citadel  of  liberty, 
and  must  be  banished  in  the  interest  of  freedom 
and  of  free  Institutions.     These  cannot  be  rightly 


9  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTION-S. 

conceived  and  set  forth  by  a  science  which  is  itself 
enslaved,  being  subjected  to  a  physical  or  a  meta- 
physical method  coming  from  the  outside  and 
controlling  its  movement. 

Psychology,  in  its  broadest  sweep,  is  the  science 
of  the  Self,  both  human  and  divine ;  it  has  as  its 
center  the  Person,  who  is  also  the  center  of  the 
Universe  both  within  and  without.  This  Self  (or 
Ego)  is  its  own  inner  process,  the  self -active, 
self-determined,  free;  any  method  to  which  it 
subjects  itself  must  be  its  own ;  any  control  of  it 
must  finally  be  self-control,  any  government  over 
it  must  finally  be  self-government.  The  science  of 
Psychology  must,  therefore,  above  all  sciences, 
show  an  inner  unfoldinof,  an  unfolding  through 
itself  which  is  just  the  Self.  Distinctions  it  must 
haye,  but  these  are  to  spring  from  its  own  process, 
self -generated,  not  thrust  into  it  from  the  outside, 
from  some  alien  source.  As  the  Ego  is  self- 
unfolding,  so  the  science  of  the  Ego  (which  is 
Psychology)  must  be  self-unfolding  likewise, 
moving  forward  through  its  own  process  and 
positing  its  own  distinctions. 

Now  this  process  of  the  Self,  in  its  first  and 
simplest,  as  well  as  in  its  highest  and  most  con- 
crete forms,  has  been  given  its  own  separate 
name  in  our  nomenclature :  it  is  called  the  Ps}'- 
chosis.  This  is  the  fundamental  act  of  self- 
consciousness,  the  act  whereby  man  is  self- 
conscious  ;  we  shall  see  it  to  be  the  building  prin- 


INTRODUCTION.  9 

ciple  of  the  total  institutional  edifice  from  bottom 
to  top.  The  Psychosis  may  be  deemed  the  pri- 
mordial psychological  cell,  which  reproduces  itself 
through  its  own  genetic  energy  and  develops  into 
the  thousandfold  forms  of  science,  one  of  which 
is  our  present  theme.  As  the  human  organism  in 
all  its  variety  of  shape  and  function  is  declared 
to  have  its  generative  unit  in  the  simple  cell,  so 
the  spiritual  universe  has  its  generative  unit  in 
the  Psychosis. 

Such  is  the  unitarj^  principle  which  both  evolves 
and  orders  the  present  book,  running  through 
it  an,d  jointing  it  together  from  beginning  to  end. 
We  seek  to  reveal  the  institutional  world  as  a 
cosmos,  as  an  ordered  whole,  whose  creative 
germ  lies  in  the  Psychosis  and  unfolds  into  the 
most  mature  fruits  of  civilization.  To  be  sure, 
its  undeveloped  primal  form  looks  very  different 
from  its  ultimate,  highly  complex  shapes;  just 
as  the  unpretentious  microscopic  cell  looks  very 
different  from  its  evolved  human  body.  And  the 
bare  statement  of  the  Ps3^chosis  by  itself  has  as 
little  outer  resemblance  to  the  completely  realized 
Psychosis,  as  the  acorn  has  to  the  oak;  yet  the 
acorn  unfolds  into  the  oak. 

II.  Psychology  is,  however,  wider  than  the 
science  of  Institutions,  which  is  but  one  branch 
of  the  same — that  branch  which  we  may  call, 
from  the  present  outlook.  Institutional  Psychol- 
ogy.    The  point   from  which    Institutions   take 


10  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

their  psychical  departure  is  the  Will,  though  the 
other  leading  psychical  activities,  as  feeling  and 
intellect,  do  not  and  cannot  absent  themselves. 
For  the  mind  is  a  whole,  and  acts  as  a  whole, 
though  one  of  its  stages  may  and  indeed  must 
receive  the  emphasis.  Accordingly  we  shall 
alwaj-s  be  coming  back  to  the  Will  as  the  foun- 
tain head  of  the  following  exposition. 

But  the  sphere  of  the  Will  is  also  wider  than 
that  of  Institutions.  The  characteristiG  fact  of 
the  Will  is  an  outering  of  the  Self,  it  is  the  sub- 
ject (or  Ego)  making  itself  object.  Of  this 
activity  of  the  Will  w^e  have  elsewhere  pointed 
out  and  desicjnated  the  three  uudn  stages  —  the 
Psychological  Will,  the  Moral  Will,  and  the 
Institutional  Will.  (See  our  work,  The  Will 
and  its  World,  p.  29.) 

III.  Just  here  we  wish  to  call  the  reader's 
attention  to  the  pivotal  expression  which  gives  the 
psychological  form  of  the  Institution,  and  which 
we  employ  throughout  the  following  treatise. 
This  expression  is :  Will  acfualized.  Every 
Institution  is  some  form  of  Will  actualized. 
Thus  we  have  a  term  which  gives  the  psycholog- 
ical unit  of  the  institutional  world.  Just  as  we 
have  by  analogy  considered  the  Psychosis  to  be 
the  unitary  cell  of  all  Ps3'chology,  so  we  may 
consider  Will  actualized  to  be  the  unitary  cell  of 
aU  Institutions,  or  rather  of  Institutional  Psy- 
chology. 


INTEODUCTION.  11 

Probably  at  this  point  there  is  a  demand  for 
some  explanation  of  the  term  in  question,  though 
the  entire  book  is  really  its  explanation,  or,  as  we 
hope,  its  explication.  Will  is  actualized  in  an 
object  which  is  itself  Will,  and  this  is  a  Will  which 
wills  Will.  Such  an  object,  which  is  existent  in 
the  World  as  Will,  whose  end  and  purpose  is  to 
secure  Will,  is  an  Institution.  The  State,  for 
instance,  is  a  Will,  objective,  existent  in  the 
world,  whose  function  is  to  safeguard  my  activity 
(or  Will)  through  the  law. 

Actualized  Will,  therefore,  is  not  simply  my 
putting  my  Will  into  an  external  thing,  as  ^vhon 
I  write  or  make  a  steam-engine;  nor- is  it  when  I 
externalize  my  Will  in  conduct,  which  is  the  basis 
of  morals.  Both  these  cases  we  may  call  A^'ill 
realized,  but  not  actualized/  the  latter  is  an 
objective  Will,  independent  of  mine,  yet  secur- 
ing mine ;  it  is  the  Will  as  actual  and  not  merely 
as  real.  Actualized  Will,  then,  is  the  content  or 
subject-matter  of  institutional  science,  while  the 
Psychosis  is  the  creative  form  or  procedure  which 
it  has  in  common  with  all  science. 

Later  in  this  Introduction  we  shall  come  back 
to  the  present  subject.  But  now  we  shall  pass  to 
the  divisions  of  the  institutional  world  and  their 
order.  Already  we  have  noticed  that  the  insti- 
tutional Will  is  the  third  stage  of  the  psychical 
l)rocess  of  Will  in  general,  being  a  returning  to 
and  a  sccurini;,'  of  individual  Will.      But  this  same 


12  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

psychical  process  (the  Psychosis)  we  are  now  to 
see  at  work  ordering  the  world  of  Institutions, 
which  has  also  three  stages.  These  we  shall 
name  the  Secular  Institution,  the  Religious  In- 
stitution, and  the  Educative  Institution,  which 
together  form  the  complete  institutional  cycle. 

IV.  The  Secular  Institution,  as  its  name  indi- 
cates, deals  with  the  secular  life  of  man,  which  is 
full  oTf  wants,  desires,  Unite  ends.  That  is,  man's 
Will  in  secular  life  is  immediate,  natural,  individ- 
ual ;  he  is  in  a  so-called  state  of  nature.  Now  the 
Secular  Institution  is  to  mediate  this  immediate 
AYill  of  the  natural  man ;  he  may  fultill  his  desire, 
satisf}^  his  bodily  needs,  yet  all  this  is  to  be  done 
not  immediately,  but  institutionally.  He  must 
appease  his  hunger,  but  he  is  not  to  seize  his 
loaf  of  bread  anywhere  or  anyhow  (inmiediately)  ; 
he  is  to  obtain  it  through  the  Social  Order  (in- 
stitutionally). Hence  we  may  say  that  the  Secular 
Institution  has  to  institutionalize  the  secular  man. 

Thus  the  human  being  is  raised  out  of  his  purely 
individual  existence  into  a  universal  life,  in  which 
not  merely  one,  the  strongest,  can  have  his  desires 
and  wants  satisfied,  but  all  can;  or,  to  make  the 
statement  more  complete,  not  one  alone  can  be 
free,  but  all  can  be  free.  For  freedom  is  the 
great  end  of  Institutions,  which  are  themselves 
forms  of  actualized  Will,  whose  ideal  function  is 
to  safeguard  and  to  confirm  Free-Will  under  all 
circumstances 


INTRODUCTION.  13 

While  the  Secular  Institution  thus  vindicates 
the  individual  Will,  it  demands  the  subordination 
of  the  same  to  itself  as  willing  what  is  universal 
or  for  all  individuals.  It  may  enforce  this  sub- 
ordination from  the  outside,  by  external  power, 
if  necessary.  Still  the  truly  institutional  spirit 
will  of  itself  perform  the  act  of  submission,  be- 
holding in  the  Institution  its  own  hisfher  Self. 
The  law  which  it  obeys  is  its  own,  being  through 
the  Institution  rescued  from  lawlessness  on  the  one 
hand,  and  becoming  self-legislative  on  the  other. 

The  Secular  Institution  will  show  its  process  in 
three  great  institutional  forms  —  Family,  Society, 
State  —  all  of  which  are  to  be  set  forth  in  detail 
further  on.  But  the  supreme  contrast  with  the 
Secular  Institution,  its  counterpart  and  its  foun- 
dation in  one  sense,  is  the  Religious  Institution, 
which  we  shall  here  briefly  touch  upon. 

V.  The  Religious  Institution  also  deals  with 
the  human  Will,  not,  however,  in  its  immediate 
form  (such  as  we  behold  in  the  Secular  Institu- 
tion) but  in  its  self-separating  and  self -renounc- 
ing form  which  submits  itself  from  the  start  to 
the  universal  Will,  to  the  Absolute  Person,  God. 
"Not  my  Will,  but  Thine  be  done,"  is  the  funda- 
mental utterance  of  the  religious  consciousness, 
whose  deepest  prayer  is,  "Thy  WiU  be  done  on 
Earth  as  it  is  in  Heaven." 

Thus  we  find  that  the  Religious  Institution  is  to 
actualize  the   individual  Will  in  its  breach  with 


14  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

itself,  whereby  it  seeks  to  separate  itself  from 
its  rude,  natural,  simply  self-assertive  stage,  and 
to  subordinate  itself  to  the  Supreme  Will.  Ac- 
cordingly, the  religious  Will  is  the  second  phase 
of  institutional  Will,  in  the  complete  Psychosis 
of  all  Institutions.  The  human  Self  surrenders 
itself  to  the  Divine  Self  above,  thus  getting  rid 
of  selfishness  yet  attaining  true  selfhood ;  for  the 
Divine  Self  is  man's  own  highest  Self  in  Person, 
is  the  universal  Self  which  is  to  make  him  uni- 
versal, too,  in  his  willing  and  doing.  Thus  in 
the  best  sense  the  act  of  self-renunciation,  upon 
which  the  Religious  Institution  is  built,  is  an  act 
of  self-assertion,  though  not  in  its  immediate, 
secular  meaning.  In  fact  the  self -renouncing 
deed  may  and  often  does  require  a  mightier  effort 
of  volition  than  any  other  human  act.  The  will- 
power of  Christ  as  we  read  his  expression  of  it 
in  the  New"  Testament,  was  the  very  strongest, 
nay  superhuman;  nor  did  Socrates  or  even 
Buddha  lack  in  the  same  respect.  But  the  Will 
in  this  very  work  of  renouncing  itself,  at  last 
Hnds  itself,  which  shows  the  third  stage  or  the 
return  and  the  self-recovery  of  the  disrupted 
human  Ego,  usually  called  in  religious  language 
the  reconciliation  Avith  God,  which  is  also  the 
reconciliation  with  Self. 

We  may  here  see  that  the  Secular  Institution 
goes  back  to,  or  rather  reaches  forward  to,  the 
Relisious  Institution  for  a  foundation,  since  the 


INTBODUCTION.  15 

latter  is  the  orund  trainer  of  the  Will  to  an  insti- 
tutional  life.  The  Secular  Institution  also  de- 
mands the  subordination  of  the  Will  to  itself,  to 
its  Law,  which  is,  in  form  at  least,  external,  is 
imposed  from  without.  But  the  Religious  Insti- 
tution calls  for  and  calls  forth  the  inner  submis- 
sion of  the  Self  within  itself  to  the  Supreme  Will . 
When  I  can  say  in  truth :  ' '  Not  my  Will  but 
Thine  be  done,''  I  have  separated  my  Will  from 
itself,  from  its  own  immediate  gratification,  and 
have  subjected  it  to  the  AVill  of  God  through  its 
own  act.  Thus  it  is  a  broken,  yea  a  self -broken 
Will ;  it  is  that  ' '  broken  and  contrite  heart ' ' 
which  is  the  first  stage  of  initiation  into  the 
Religious  Institution.  Yet  in  this  way  and  in 
this  way  alone,  does  the  Will  recover  itself  and 
reach  reconciliation  "in  the  peace  of  God." 

Religiosity,  then,  springs  from  this  breach  of 
the  individual  Will  with  itself,  its  falling  out  with 
Self  primarily,  and  likewise  with  all  secularit}- . 
Yet  it  returns  to  unity  with  itself  through  the 
Religious  Institution,  which  is  here  a  form  of 
actualized  Will,  existent  in  the  world,  with  its 
worship,  rites,  creed,  priesthood.  Thus  the  Re- 
ligious Institution  makes  actual  the  complete  pro- 
cess of  the  Will,  starting  with  the  "broken  Will " 
and  returning  to  the  healing  of  the  Will — whereb}^ 
the  religious  process  is  completed  and  the  Will  is 
made  whole.  In  this  state  it  has  become  trul}'^ 
an  institutional  AYill  to  its  innermost  depths.    And 


16  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  fact  ou^ht  not  to  be  f orofotten  that  the  Greatest 

~  c^  c 

trainer  to  such  a  Will  for  our  race,  at  least  for 
the  Occidental  portion  thereof,  has  been  and 
doubtless  still  is  the  Hebrew  Bible,  whose  record 
is  one  long  line  of  terrific  disciplining  the  chosen 
people  into  an  institutional  life. 

The  Religious  Institution  has,  accordingly, 
actualized  the  individual  Ego  as  Will  in  its  second 
stage,  the  self -renouncing,  which  is  the  grand 
discipline  of  the  Will,  personal,  perennial,  in- 
dispensable. And  now  comes  the  third  stage  of 
this  entire  institutional  Ps3'chosis,  manifested 
also  in  an  Institution  which  is  to  return  and  to 
reproduce  both  the  Secular  and  the  Religious  In- 
stitutions. For  the}^  have  to  be  eternally  recreated 
and  made  active  in  every  individual  member  of 
the  institutional  world,  which  work  is  the  func- 
tion of  a  special  Institution  which  we  may  next 
glance  at. 

VI.  This  is  what  we  have  already  named  the 
Educative  Institution,  whose  highest  object  is  to 
reproduce  the  institutional  Person.  Every  born 
Ego  is  to  be  trained  into  its  spiritual  inheritance, 
which  is  supremely  the  world  of  Institutions. 
The  child  goes  to  school  ultimately  for  this  pur- 
pose, though  of  it  both  he  and  his  teacher  may 
be  unconscious.  But  not  alone  the  child  at  school 
is  subject  to  this  discipline ;  every  individual, 
young  and  old,  of  every  grade  in  society,  is  through 
Education  to  be  trained  into  an  institutional  con- 


INTRODUCTION.  17 

sciousness  internally  and  into  an  institutional  life 
externally. 

Of  course  Education  gives  other  things  very 
necessary  to  man  in  his  social  relations.  It  gives 
useful  knowledge,  it  fosters  learning,  it  brings 
development.  Still  its  ultimate  end,  the  end  for 
which  everything  else  becomes  a  means,  is  the 
reproduction  and  perpetual  re-vivification  of  In- 
stitutions in  every  human  soul. 

Thus  Education  has  a  sweep  far  beyond  the 
School  proper,  beyond  even  the  College  and  the 
University.  There  is  the  School  of  Life,  the  Uni- 
versity of  Civilization,  of  which  all  men  and 
women  in  one  way  or  other  must  be  members, 
and  in  which  they  must  be  disciplined  through 
Education.  Art,  Science,  Literature,  History, 
Philosophy  are  branches  in  this  vast  Educative 
Institution,  and  their  highest  object  is  not  to  give 
pleasure  merely,  not  to  impart  information  simply, 
but  is  to  re-create  and  to  make  alive  and  active  in 
all  minds  the  whole  institutional  world,  of  which 
everybody  is  a  member  and  of  which  everybody 
ought  to  be  a  livino-  incarnation. 

Shakespeare,  for  instance,  is  the  great  institu- 
tional poet  of  Anglo-Saxondom,  and  he  may  well 
be  deemed  a  supreme  teacher  in  the  Educative 
Institution.  To  be  sure  he  has  to  be  rightly 
studied.  His  poetry  exists  in  this  world  not 
merely  to  amuse,  though  it  gives  amusement; 
not  merely    to  furnish  knowledge,  though  it  has 

2 


18  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

H  great  deal  of  information  to  impart ;  not  merely 
to  teach  human  nature,  though  its  insight  into 
character  is  unparalleled.  The  supreme  initiation 
into  the  Shakesperian  Pantheon  is  the  vision  of 
and  participation  in  his  institutional  world. 

So  we  have  as  the  final  highest  department  of 
our  Educative  Institution  what  we  may  call  the 
World-School,  or  the  universal  Universitj^,  which 
has  one  supreme  Teacher,  none  other  than  the 
World-Spirit  itself.  Still  this  Spirit  has  to  be 
incarnated  in  visible  human  representatives, the 
Artist,  Poet,  Thinker,  Scientist,  each  of  whom  in 
his  way,  after  his  own  form  of  utterance,  imparts 
his  message  to  mankind.  All  Art,  Literature, 
Science,  Philosophy,  which  are  worthy  of  the 
name,  hold  up  before  man  a  colossal  image  of 
the  institutional  Self  both  in  its  human  and 
divine  process,  and  have  their  ultimate  end  and  jus- 
tification in  the  Educative  Institution  of  Human- 
ity. They  exist  finally  for  man's  Education,  and 
from  this  point  of  view  are  to  be  developed  and 
ordered  in  any  system  of  thought.  They  are  to 
train  the  human  being  of  every  class  and  voca- 
tion into  a  universal  life,  which,  when  made 
concrete  by  actual  living,  is  found  to  be  institu- 
tional. 

Thus  we  stretch  our  thoughts  to  take  in  and  to 
put  together  the  vast  outline,  and  perchance  we 
may  have  to  stretch  our  speech  to  the  utterance  of 
the   mighty    sweep    of   this  institutional  Avorld. 


INTRODUCTION.  19 

The  three  forms  of  actualized  Will,  the  Sec- 
ular, the  Religious  and  the  Educative  Institu- 
tions, organize  the  present  book  and  constitute 
the  primal  institutional  Psychosis,  which  is  the 
unifying  principle  pervading  and  ordering  the 
whole.  Such  is  the  positive  element  in  all  Insti- 
tutions, but  there  is  another  and  opposite 
element,  which  cannot  be  left  out  of  the  reckon- 
ing. 

VII.  This  is  the  negative  element  which  is 
always  at  work  negating  and  undermining  the 
institutional  world  just  through  itself,  through  its 
own  forms.  Thus  we  witness  a  Negative  Family, 
a  Negative  Society,  and  even  a  Negative  Church. 
A  self -destroying  activity  is  generated  in  Institu- 
tions, which  turns  them  back  and  may  whirl  them 
down  to  the  very  starting-point  of  their  develop- 
ment. This  destructive  energy  must  again  be 
referred  to  the  individual  Will,  which  may  refuse 
to  will  the  institutional  world,  indeed  may  will 
just  the  opposite,  and  do  so  in  pursuit  of  what  it 
deems  its  own  freedom.  Thus  the  individual 
AVill  separates  itself  from  and  assails  the  actual- 
ized Will,  whose  very  purpose  is  to  secure  and  to 
establish  the  individual  Will  and  all  Will.  Such 
is  the  deep  inner  dualism  which  nowunfolds  itself 
in  the  institutional  world  just  at  its  starting-point 
in  the  Will,  and  which  causes  it  to  fall  backward 
into  less  and  less  advanced  forms  of  itself,  some- 
times to  the  verv  bottom. 


20  so  CIAL  ■  /iV  S  TI TUTION  S. 

Here  it  is  necessary  to  note  the  psychical 
movement.  This  negative  process  belongs  to  the 
separative  stage  which  is  always  the  second  one 
of  the  Psychosis,  while  the  positive  process,  as 
already  set  forth,  belongs  to  the  first  stage. 
Accordingly,  after  unfolding  the  Institution  as  it 
is  in  its  positive,  normal  stage,  or  as  it  stands 
immediately  before  us,  we  have  to  pass  to  this 
second  or  negative  stage,  which  shows  the  same 
Institution  reverting  to  former  conditions  of  it- 
self. Examples  cannot  be  here  given,  as  they 
will  be  seen  in  the  special  treatment  of  every 
Institution.  Thus,  however,  it  is  manifest  that 
we  cannot  leave  out  of  the  institutional  process 
the  negative  element  of  decline,  decadence,  re- 
version. From  this  element  no  society  is  wholly 
exempt  at  any  time ;  though  its  general  movement 
may  be  progressive,  w^e  shall  find  in  it  some- 
where a  counter  current,  or  an  under  current 
which  is  runnino;  backward.  This  must  be  taken 
into  account  if  we  are  to  see  the  total  process. 

In  confirmation  of  the  present  view  we  are  able 
to  cite  the  judgment  of  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer. 
Says  he:  "There  are  sundry  reasons  for  suspect- 
ing that  existing  men  of  the  lowest  types  form- 
ing social  groups  of  the  simplest  kinds  do  not 
exemplify  men  as  they  originally  were.  Proba- 
bly most  of  them,  if  not  all,  had  ancestors  in 
higher  states;  and  among  their  beliefs  remain 
some  which  were  evolved    during  those  higher 


INTEODUCTION.  21 

states."  (Spencer's  Sociology,  p.  106.)  Still 
further  in  the  same  place  he  proceeds :  "  I  believe 
that  retrogression  has  been  as  frequent  as  pro- 
gression." 

We  have  to  think  that  the  foregoing  statements 
show  Mr.  Spencer's  remarkable  perspicacity  as 
to  particular  facts,  but  also  bring  to  the  surface 
his  lack  in  organizing  completely  his  own  thought. 
For  in  his  method  he  follows  the  ascending:  or 
evolutionary  movement,  whereas  he  declares  that 
the  reasons  are  as  many  and  as  strong  for  the 
opposite  movement,  which  is  the  negative  or  the 
reversionary  movement.  Both  must  be  included 
in  the  process  of  the  Institution,  which  brings  us 
to  consider  its  ascent. 

VIII.  This  is  the  evolutionary  side  of  the  in- 
stitutional world,  the  overcoming  of  the  negative 
movement  just  witnessed.  After  the  fall  comes 
the  rise,  the  sweep  downward  has  its  counterpart 
and  corrective  in  the  sweep  upward.  Evolution 
is  the  grand  response  to  negation  in  every  form. 
It  is  the  real  answer  of  the  age  to  its  own  skep- 
ticism and  inner  disruption  and  decadence.  Man, 
denying  the  truth  and  validity  of  Institutions, 
sinks  down  to  the  animal,  but  Evolution  picks  up 
the  animal  even  and  brings  it  up  to  man.  Goethe 
already  felt  in  Natural  Science  an  answer  to  his 
doubt,  and  trained  himself  by  its  study  to  write 
his  greatest  poem,  Faust,  which  shows  both  the 
descending  and  the  ascending  movement   in  the 


22  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

soul  of  his  hero,  and  this  is  also  the  soul  of  the 
age.  Evolution  is,  therefore,  the  third  act  of 
the  Psychosis  of  each  Institution,  the  return  to 
and  restoration  of  the  positive  after  passing 
through  the  negative. 

It  may  be  here  noted  that  in  the  word  Evolu- 
tion lies  couched  the  idea  of  rolling,  of  somethino- 
which  turns  on  itself  while  going  forward.  Not 
simple  rotation  on  an  axis,  but  also  an  advancing 
in  and  through  such  rotation,  like  the  wheel  of  a 
vehicle.  Still  further  we  may  carry  the  analogy  : 
that  which  seems  a  straight  line  running  on  ahead, 
is  really  a  curved  line  returning  into  itself ;  the  road 
on  which  the  wheel  of  the  vehicle  is  turning,  if 
continued  to  its  end,  circles  the  Earth  and  comes 
back  to  its  starting-point.  In  the  free  space  of 
the  Heavens  the  Earth's  rotation  on  its  axis  and 
its  cyclical  movement  in  its  orbit  show  both  prin- 
ciples working  together  in  pristine  harmony  never- 
ceasing,  and  furnish  a  completely  externalized 
image  of  the  inner  Universe,  of  the  absolute 
Psychosis  itself.  Evolution  is  one  stage,  or  rather 
one  segment  of  this  vast  cycle,  which  cycle,  with- 
out it,  remains  incomplete. 

In  the  Evolution  of  Institutions  as  a  whole  we 
first  note  that  they  are  all  united  in  one  primal 
form  out  of  which  they  develop  into  differen- 
tiation. At  the  start  there  is  no  separation  be- 
tween the  Secular,  Religious,  and  Educative 
Institutions.     This  cmbrvonic  form  has  also  its 


INTRODUCTION.  23 

stages,  but  is  doubtless  to  be  traced  back  to  the 
primitive  Family,  which  we  may  consider  the  first 
existent  shape  of  Will  actualized,  and  which  con- 
nects closely  Avith  the  animal  world. 

Only  the  barest  outline  of  institutional  Evolu- 
tion can  be  here  given.  Later  on  there  will  be 
special  applications  which  can  be  made  supple, 
mentary  at  this  point :  — 

(1)  We  naturally  go  back  to  savage  life  and  to 
the  Orient  in  order  to  catch  the  beginning  of 
things.  In  the  East  all  Institutions  partake  of 
the  patriarchate ;  the  ruler  is  primarily  the  father 
of  the  Familv,  of  his  City,  of  his  People;  he  is 
also  chief  priest  and  supreme  judge,  as  Avell  as 
leader  in  war.  The  education  of  the  child 
takes  place  almost  wholly  in  the  Family  or  directly 
through  it.  Great  religions  spring  up,  great 
states  arise,  still  they  never  slough  off  paternal- 
ism, and  hence  never  reach  the  conception  of 
institutional  freedom, 

(2)  The  Secular  Institution  develops  in 
Greece  andBome,  though  there  is  at  first  a  com- 
plete unity  between  the  Secular  and  Ecligious  Insti- 
tutions in  the  Family,  and  something  of  this  unity 
remained  in  a  formal  way  when  all  faith  in  the 
old  religion  had  fled.  M.  de  Coulangcs  in  his 
book  on  The  Ancient  City  (p.  52)  goes  so  far 
as  to  say  that  "the  ancient  Family  (Roman) 
was  a  religious  rather  than  a  natural  association." 
But  at  last  it  became  mainlv  a  Secular  Institu- 


24  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tion,  along  with  State  and  Society,  all  of  them 
being  defined  and  controlled  by  the  secular  law 
of  Rome.  Thus  arose  Occidental  civilization  in 
contrast  with  Oriental,  being  marked  by  the 
complete  development  of  secularity  with  the  cor- 
responding decline  of  religiosity. 

The  great  movement  of  the  Greco-Roman  world 
was,  accordingly,  the  rise  of  the  Secular  and  the 
fall  of  the  Religious  Institution,  culminating  in 
Greek  Philosophy  and  Ethics  on  the  theoretic 
side,  and  Roman  Law  and  Administration  on  the 
practical  side,  both  sides  bemg  secular.  That 
antique  civilization  was  the  mighty  training  of  the 
race  to  a  secular  institutional  life,  which  is  our 
priceless  heritage  from  it,  but  it  ended  in  irre- 
ligion,  with  consequent  decadence  and  evanish- 
ment.  We  have  rejected  the  Religion  of  the 
Greeks  and  Romans,  but  they  first  rejected  it 
themselves.  We  still  retain,  however,  the  essence 
of  their  Secular  Institutions,  their  monogamy  in 
the  Family,  for  instance,  their  social  jurispru- 
dence, and  many  of  their  municipal  and  political 
arrangements. 

(3)  The  next  great  institutional  movement  was 
the  restoration  of  the  Religious  Institution  to  the 
Occident.  This  was  the  work  of  Christianity, 
whose  supreme  function  was  to  bring  back  to 
civiUzation  the  God-consciousness  which  had  been 
substantially  lost  in  that  antique  world,  whereby 
it  was  itself  lost.     In  the  fullness  of  time  the 


INTRODUCTION.  25 

Church  rises  to  view  as  the  organized  Religious 
Institution,  asserting  itself  strongly,  sometimes 
too  strongly,  as  distinct  from  Family,  Society, 
State,  and  all  secular  life.  But  the  Church  has 
had  its  evolutionary  process,  not  by  any  means  a 
tame  one,  from  its  primitive  form  through  the 
medieval  period  down  to  the  present. 

IX.  In  regard  to  the  Evolution  of  the  Educa- 
tive Institution  it  can  be  said  that  this  is  sroinoj 
on  with  a  peculiar  epoch-making  energy  just  in 
the  present  age.  The  School  in  some  form  was 
undoubtedly  implicit  from  the  beginning  in  the 
institutional  unit  asFamih^  Tribe  or  Community. 
But  it  has  been  the  last  to  unfold  itself  fully  into 
an  independent  Institution,  which  it  is  doing  just 
now  in  the  most  advanced  countries  of  the  world. 
Hitherto  it  has  been  largely  kept  under  the  tute- 
lage of  other  Institutions,  the  Family,  the  State, 
and  especially  the  Church.  The  fact  that  it  is 
often  supported  by  taxation  does  not  make 
it  a  political  Institution,  though  some  poli- 
ticians hold  that  view,  and  pervert  it 
from  its  purpose.  The  Educative  Institution 
may  be  said  to  be  engaged  at  present  in  a 
struggle  for  freedom,  it  has  declared  and  is 
lighting  for  its  independence  as  an  Institution 
co-equal  and  co-ordinate  with  the  other  Institu- 
tions, Secular  and  Religious —  their  strong  sup- 
porter and  ally,  but  not  their  menial.  In  aland 
of  free  Institutions,  it  must  itself  be  a  free  Insti- 


26  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tution,  whose  supreme  end  is  to  train  every  born 
individual  into  being  a  free  man,  that  is,  free 
institutionally,  not  capriciously. 

And  here  it  ought  to  be  added  that  this  Institu- 
tional Psychology  is  properly  the  science  of 
freedom,  just  that  and  nothing  else,  and  more- 
over the  only  science  of  freedom.  Hence  it  is 
the  science  which  the  on-coming  free  citizen 
should  appropriate  above  all  others ;  it  shows 
him  to  himself  in  his  institutional  relations, 
which  alone  can  make  him  a  free  man  among 
free  men  in  a  free  world.  A  people  must  ha^e  a 
science  of  itself,  Avliich  expresses  the  funda- 
mental fact  of  its  life  and  its  spirit ;  a  free  people 
must  ultimately  possess  a  free  science,  which  is 
justjthe  science  of  freedom.  Natural  Science  is 
notoriously-  unfrce,  dominated  whoU}'^  by  the 
physical  world  of  necessity,  Avhich  characteristic 
usually  goes  over  into  the  faith  and  philosophy 
of  its  one-sided  devotees.  Natural  Science  has 
no  Free-AVill,  cannot  have  by  virtue  of  its  own 
limitation ;  still  less  has  it  a  Free-Will  which 
wills  Free-Will,  or  any  conception  thereof. 
Hence  it  cannot  furnish  the  method  or  even  the 
concrete  subject-matter  for  a  science  of  Institu- 
tions, which  is  veritably  the  science  of  freedom 
from  beoinnino;  to  end.  Natural  Science  has  an 
important  place  in  the  curriculum  of  the  Educa- 
tive Institution,  as  it  gives  an  element  of  the 
total  process  of  human   education :   still  it  cannot 


INTRODUCTION.  27 

have  the  dominating  place,  which,  in  a  free  hind, 
must  be  given  just  to  the  science  of  freedom. 
This  is  none  other  than  the  science  of  Institutions, 
which,  we  have  to  add,  is  not  the  Sociology  of 
the  present  time. 

X.  Summary .  We  shall  here  give  a  brief  ab- 
stract of  the  main  distinctions  and  divisions  elabo- 
rated in  the  preceding  account,  and  thereby  present 
the  whole  succeeding  exposition  in  outline. 

(«)  The  movement  of  the  entire  institutional 
world  we  have  seen  unfolding  itself  into  the  fol- 
lowing^ three  fundamental  forms :  — 

(I)  The  Secular  Institution. 

(II)  The  Keligious  Institution. 

(III)  The  Educative  Institution. 

These  are  united  in  what  we  have  called  the 
institutional  Psychosis,  which  is  the  process  of 
Will  actualizing  itself,  and  which  gives  not  only 
the  one  supreme  division  of  the  science,  but  like- 
wise all  the  small  divisions,  thus  unifying  it  and 
connectins:  it  throughout  in  the  one  method  of 
organization. 

(b)  Each  of  these  Institutions,  accordingly, 
has  its  own  process,  which  is  nevertheless  a  pro- 
cess common  to  them  all.  The  divisions  of  this 
process  arc  designated  as  follows  :  — 

(I)  The  positive  element  of  the  given  Insti- 
tution. 

(II)  The  negative  element  of  the  given  In- 
stitution. 


28  Social  institutions. 

(Ill)  The  Evolution  of  the  given  Institu- 
tion. 

These  three  elements,  though  separately  con- 
sidered, are  ahvavs  brought  too^ether  as  staofes  of 
one  process,  which  is  also  a  Psychosis. 

(c)  In  the  historic  development  of  the  insti- 
tutional Avorld,  as  a  whole,  Ave  start  with  the 
embryonic  Institution  out  of  which  unfold  the 
others,  and  which  is  the  primitive  Family.  Pass- 
ing over  for  the  present  this  stage  of  institutional 
embryology,  we  observe  in  our  Occidental  civili- 
zation the  three  fundamental  Institutions  in  the 
following  historic  evolution  : — 

(I)  The  Secular  Institution,  evolved  definitely 
and  separately  in  Greco-Roman  antiquity. 

(II)  The  Religious  Institution,  evolved  defin- 
itel}'  and  separately  in  the  Christian  Church. 

(III)  The  Educative  Institution,  now  in  the 
process  of  evolving  itself  into  an  independent 
Institution,  especially  in  countries  having  free 
Institutions,  which  demand  a  science  of  freedom 
as  the  chief  discipline  of  a  free  Educative  Insti- 
tution. 

XI.  Actualized  Will.  Alreadv  we  have  em- 
ployed this  formula  as  indicating  the  psychical 
source  of  the  institutional  world,  and  as  uttering 
the  genetic  principle  of  the  present  work.  Per- 
haps what  we  have  already  said  about  it  is  sutfi- 
cient  for  some  readers ;  but  there  are  doubtless 
others  who  wish  to  have  a  more  detailed  cxplica- 


INTRODUCTION.  29 

tion  of  its  meaning,  even  at  the  risk  of  having  to 
peruse  some  repetitions.  And  here  we  may  say 
that  we  shall  often  have  to  come  back  to  it  in  the 
course  of  the  following  treatise,  in  order  to  keep 
before  the  mind  the  unitary  principle  of  all  the 
different  Institutions  in  their  varied  develop- 
ment. 

Institutions,  then,  are  forms  of  actualized 
Will,  entities  produced  by  Will  and  endowed  with 
"Will  for  the  purpose  of  securing  and  affirming 
Will.  Their  supreme  end  is  the  actualization  of 
Free-Will  in  the  world,  or  the  complete  fultill- 
ment  of  man's  aspiration  for  freedom.  They 
have  in  them  always  a  return  to  Will ;  the  Ego  as 
self -active  creates  the  world  of  Institutions, 
which  returns  to  the  Ego  and  makes  valid  just 
that  self -activity  in  every  human  being. 

If  we  look  about  us,  we  have  no  difficulty 
in  finding  many  instances  of  these  Institutions, 
which  are  indeed  an  intimate  part  of  ourselves, 
such  as  Family,  State,  Church,  etc.  Then  we 
may  observe  manifold  kinds  of  association  among 
men,  which  go  by  the  name  of  Institutions,  such 
as  a  banking  Institution,  a  benevolent  Institu- 
tion. The  latter  are  mainly  lesser  forms  or  su])or- 
dinate  phases  of  the  one  great  Social  Institution 
which  is  to  be  considered  later. 

The  Institution,  as  here  treated,  has  therefore 
a  kind  of  selfhood,  yet  is  not  a  self,  a  person,  or 
Ego;  it  is  a  Will  existent  in  the  world,  not  sim- 


30  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ply  in  the  Ego  or  subject,  but  in  an  Object  which 
is  itself  "Will.  This  Object  is  accordingly,  not 
merely  a  realization  of  the  Will  in  some  material 
thing  or  in  conduct,  but  an  actualization  of  the 
Will  in  an  Institution. 

The  individual  Will  first  makes  itself  real  in  a 
sensuous  object,  say,  in  a  piece  of  wood,  which  it 
converts  into  a  walking  stick.  Thus  the  external 
thing  has  the  impress  of  my  Will ;  all  implements 
show  the  Ego  of  the  maker  realizing  himself 
through  his  Will,  he  is  thus  real  (res,  a  thing,  an 
object).  Still  further,  the  Ego  as  Will  performs 
an  action,  which  contains  his  Self,  and  for  which 
he  is  responsible.  If  I  strike  my  neighbor,  that 
blow  is  mine,  it  holds  my  intention  or  AVill,  in  it 
I  have  realized  myself.  Now  in  both  these  cases, 
in  what  I  make  as  well  as  in  what  I  do,  I  may  be 
said  to  have  realized  myself,  I  have  made  myself 
something  external,  I  have  put  myself  into  a 
thing  or  into  an  act.  But  I  have  not  yet  truly 
actualized  myself,  that  is,  I  have  not  yet  made 
myself  into  an  object  which  is  itself  Will  and 
acts  as  Will.  When  I  have  completely  external- 
ized myself  as  Will  through  an  act  of  my  Will,  I 
have  called  forth  a  new  Will,  namely  the  Will  as 
actual  Object,  or  the  objective  Will,  which  itself 
must  will  something,  to  be  actual.  It  is  thus  a 
kind  of  new  Self  or  Person,  indeed  my  other 
Self,  which  I  have  separated  from  me,  and  made 
active,  vea  self -active,  as  we  shall  see. 


introduction:  Si 

When  I  in  this  way  will  iiiy  own  selfhood  as 
Will  to  be  truly  and  completely  objective,  that  is, 
wdien  I  actualize  my  Will,  I  am  calling  into  ex- 
istence the  world  of  Institutions,  and  my  Will  is 
institutional,  or  ethical  (as  distinct  from  moral). 
The  institutional  Will,  therefore,  is  that  which  is 
always  actualizing  itself,  creating  Institutions  or 
making  itself  one  with  them. 

The  individual  Will,  accordingly,  in  this  its 
highest  stage  is  what  produces  the  Institutional 
World;  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  this  Institutional 
World,  as  Family,  State,  the  Social  Organism, 
existed  already,  and  the  human  being  was  born 
into  them.  Still  the  individual  has  to  produce, 
or  rather,  to  re-produce  them  through  his  own 
activity ;  every  man  has  to  make  anew  his  Insti- 
tutional World,  in  order  to  possess  it,  even 
though  it  has  been  made  before  him  and  for  him  ; 
his  own  creative  wdll-power  must  be  perpetually 
exerted  in  order  to  live  the  institutional  life, 
which  is  truly  the  life  of  the  spirit,  both  as  secu- 
lar and  as  religious.  This  is  not  merely  an  inner, 
emotional,  or  even  moral  life,  but  an  objective, 
institutional,  ethical  life  (ethical  in  the  sense  of 
the  Greek  ethos,  and  of  the  German  siftUch). 

Moreover,  this  individual  Will,  having  actual- 
ized itself,  having  taken  on  an  objective  shape 
which  is  itself  Will,  has  become  universal.  Foi> 
the  objective  Will,  which  is  the  Institution,  must 
will  something,  must  have    a   content,  purpose, 


32  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

end.  But  what  is  this  content,  purpose,  end 
of  the  objective  "Will  or  Institution?  It  is  just 
Will,  can  be  ultimately  nothing  else.  The  grand 
purpose  of  the  Institutional  "World  is  to  make  the 
Ego  as  "Will  a  fact,  a  positive  existence;  the 
Institution  is  itself  a  Will  whose  end  is  to  estab- 
lish Will  in  its  complete  process,  and  thus  to 
constitute  a  living,  active  entity  in  the  world,  not 
simply  as  individual,  but  as  universal  Will. 

The  Institution,  therefore,  being  a  Will  whose 
content  or  end  is  to  establish,  to  safeguard,  and 
to  actualize  Will,  that  is,  all  Wills  whatsoever, 
has  the  characteristic  of  universality.  This 
means  not  merely  the  common  wish  or  volition 
of  man}'^  or  all  Wills  as  particular  individuals ; 
the  universal  Will  is  what  really  secures,  renders 
possible,  and  indeed  creates  the  particular  Will. 
The  Institution,  accordingly,  returns  to  the 
individual  Ego  as  Will,  and  makes  it  actual, 
renders  it,  first  of  all,  a  Will  active  in  the  world, 
existent,  endowing  it  with  a  universality  which  is 
objective. 

For  example,  let  us  take  the  State  as  an  In- 
stitution. All  the  individuals  in  the  State  may 
have  a  common  Will,  they  may  to  a  man  desire 
to  annex  a  certain  territory,  but  their  particular 
Wills  in  this  matter,  however  strong,  cannot  be 
made  actual  without  the  Institution  whose  pur- 
pose and  function  are  to  make  Will  actual.  The 
State  must  be  present  to  secure  and  to  actualize 


IN  TB  OD  UC  TION.  33 

the  common  Will,  it  is  not  merely  this  common 
Will.  Government  does  not  exist  through  public 
opinion,  but  public  opinion  exists  actually  through 
government.  To  be  sure,  a  certain  form  of 
government,  or  a  certain  way  of  administering  a 
certain  form  of  government,  may  depend  upon 
public  opinion,  but  government  as  such  is 
before  public  opinion,  and  is  what  renders  the 
same  possible,  and  finally  actual.  The  truth 
is,  the  Institution  is  implied  in  every  act  of  the 
Ego  as  Will ;  I,  this  individual,  when  I  Avill  the 
simplest  act,  am  calling  forth  the  Institutional 
World.  This  exists  in  advance,  as  already  said, 
still  I  none  the  less  have  to  create  it  for  my- 
self. 

It  is  often  said  that  men  must  associate  to- 
gether, the  human  being  has  a  native  impulse 
to  form  a  social  order  of  some  kind.  The  indi- 
vidual, in  every  act  of  his  particular  Will,  calls 
for  the  universal  Will,  which  alone  can  give  true 
objectivity  to  his  Will.  The  crudest  social 
organization  of  the  lowest  savages  has  in  it  this 
element,  and  the  highest  Institution  of  civilized 
man  shows  the  same  fundamental  fact.  The 
science  of  association  has  to  do  essentially  Avith 
the  Institutional  Will. 

In  the  moral  sphere,  which  has  gone  before 
the  sphere  of  Institutions  (see  its  place  and 
treatment  in  TJie  Will  and  the  TFb?'M),  we  saw 
the  individual  controlled  by  his  sense  of  duty ;  he 

3 


34  ISOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

willed  to  do  the  right  which  was  also  universal, 
nay,  he  rose  to  willing  the  good  of  all  even 
against  his  own  individual  right.  Still  this  good 
was  his  own  conception  of  the  good,  it  had 
reality  only  in  himself,  it  was  subjective,  and  so 
was  subject  to  his  own  Ego.  Thus  in  form  it 
was  still  individual,  not  universal;  it  was  not 
actualized  in  the  world  and  commanding  not 
merely  his  Ego  but  all  Egos,  it  was  not  objective 
and  institutional,  having  the  authority  of  the 
living;  Institution.  I  must  indeed  obev  mv  own 
conception  of  the  good,  which  can  be  called  my 
Universal,  but  my  Universal  may  not  be  another 
man's  Universal,  and  so  is  not  universal  at  all. 
The  Good  must  be  made  actual,  existent,  eternal ; 
it  must  be  given  an  active  life  in  the  world,  inde- 
pendent of  any  particular  Will,  it  must  live  when 
I  am  dead,  it  must  be  elevated  out  of  its  sub- 
jective condition  into  an  Institution. 

In  such  terms  we  seek  to  bring  before  our- 
selves the  thought  of  the  Will  as  a  spiritual  real- 
it}',  having  realized  itself  not  simply  in  a  thing, 
not  even  in  a  moral  action  merely,  but  as  a  new 
Self  in  the  world,  or  a  new  Person  as  it  were, 
whose  function  is  to  will  the  individual  Will  and 
thereby  to  make  real  the  particular  Person  in  a 
kind  of  universal  Person.  This  reality,  as  already 
indicated,  is  better  expressed  by  the  term  actual- 
ity when  the  latter  is  once  fully  understood,  since 
it  suggests  the  activity  of  the  Will  as  its  essence. 


INTRODUCTION.  35 

I,  this  puny  iiuliN  idual,  am  lo  find  in  the  Institu- 
tional World  my  elder  and  more  powerful  brother, 
indeed  quite  all-powerful,  Avhose  universal  Will 
saves,  safeguards,  and  finall}'  actualizes  my  indi- 
vidual Self. 

We  say  that  this  Institutional  World  is  a  spiritual 
realm,  a  veritable  spirit-world,  not  visible  as  a 
material  object  or  as  a  thing  of  Nature,  yet  the 
most  solid  fact  of  existence.  What  is  man  with- 
out the  Social  Order,  without  the  State,  Family, 
Church,  Art,  Literature,  Science?  All  these 
belong  to  the  Institutional  World,  are  the  invis- 
ible spirits  dwelling  in  it,  wdiich  we  are  now  going 
to  conjure,  trying  to  make  them  assume  shapes 
for  the  inner  eye,  for  Thought,  of  which  indeed 
they  are  the  primal  creation. 

The  realm  of  freedom  is  the  Institutional 
World,  wdiose  whole  nature  is  freedom  made 
actual,  not  as  a  caprice,  not  even  as  a  subjective 
command,  but  as  an  objective  fact.  The  imme- 
diate, impulsive  Will  is  not  free,  is  not  self- 
determined,  but  is  determined  by  a  feeling  or 
impulse,  which,  though  internal,  is  properly 
external  to  the  free  Will.  The  moral  Will  is 
subjectively  free,  but  not  completely,  not  actually 
free;  the  Stoic  may  be  free  in  chains,  or  as  a 
slave,  but  he  cannot  act  as  a  freeman,  his  free- 
dom having  no  sphere  of,  action,  no  world  to  act 
in.  But  the  Institutional  World  may  be  said  to 
be  just  the  sphere  of  the  freeman,  its  chief  func- 


36  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tion  is  to  establish  his  free  "Will.  It  is  true  that 
the  imperfect  forms  of  Institutions  manifest 
freedom  imperfectly ;  but  the  whole  development 
of  the  Institutional  AVorld  from  the  dawn  of 
History,  the  whole  moyement  of  Ciyilization  is 
to  perfect  the  free  Institution.  The  end  toward 
which  History  is  moving  is  just  the  complete 
actuality  of  freedom.  The  Institutional  Will, 
therefore,  is  truly  the  free  "Will,  being  one  with 
the  Institution,  whose  essence  is  the  actualizing 
of  free  Will,  the  making  it  an  active,  living 
power  in  the  world. 

The  individual  Will  is,  accordingly,  not  free  till 
it  is  made  valid  by  the  universal  Will  which  is  not 
subjective,  but  existent,  actualized  in  an  Institu- 
tion. We  may  note  again  the  three  kinds  of  free- 
dom here  designated:  the  capricious,  the  moral, 
and  the  institutional ;  the  last  alone  is  true  free- 
dom, since  the  Will  therein  is  determined  b}' 
itself,  even  from  the  outside  world.  For  the  ex- 
ternal Institution,  as  already  said,  is  a  Will,  and 
a  Will  whose  end,  purpose,  content  is  to  render 
Will  valid.  That  is,  when  the  particular  Will  of 
the  individual  is  w^illed  by  the  universal  Will,  it 
must  be  free,  for  how  can  it  escape?  Freedom 
has  become  the  very  necessity  of  the  Will; 
my  free  act,  being  made  also  the  act  of  the  Insti- 
tution, or  the  universal  Will,  becomes  univer- 
sally free,  being  now  the  act  of  the  universal 
Person  as  it  were.     Thus  in  the  present  sphere 


INTRODUCTION.  37 

Freedom  and  Necesisity  are  no  longer  two  con- 
flicting irreconcilable  opposites,  but  are  harmo- 
nized ;  Necessity  has  joined  hands  with  Freedom 
and  compelled  it  to  be.  But  in  all  lower  stages  of 
Will  the  dualism  appears,  must  appear ;  an  imper- 
fect Freedom  is  always  imperfect  through  an  out- 
side Necessity. 

The  student  is  now  to  see  that  every  act  of  his 
individual  Will,  even  the  humblest,  ideally  implies 
its  completion,  which  is  actually  the  Institutional 
World.  If  I  make  a  toothpick,  I  have  realized 
my  will  in  a  small  object  for  some  finite  end ;  but 
this  realization  of  my  Will,  were  it  completed, 
would  itself  be  Will;  my  act  of  volition,  being 
the  objectifying  principle,  must  finally  objectify 
itself  as  a  whole ;  the  act,  the  process  must  be- 
come the  object,  when  it  has  fully  realized  itself. 
My  Will,  having  realized  itself  in  a  toothpick, 
has  shown  its  nature  to  be  self-realization ;  it  has 
to  make  itself  a  reality  in  the  world,  and  this 
reality  of  itself  is  not  a  material  object,  but  a  Will 
which  is  active  likewise,  an  actuality,  an  Institu- 
tion. 

Thus  the  Ego  as  an  act  of  Will  shows  a  going 
forth  out  of  itself,  a  separation  from  itself;  it  is 
its  (jther,  it  makes  itself  object.  Such  is  the 
fundamental  self -separation  involved  in  all  Will. 
But  this  object,  separated  by  Will  from  itself,  is 
(inally  itself,  namely  the  oljjcctivc  or  actualized 
Will.     Herein  the  Ego  as  Will  has  returned  into 


317143 


38  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

itself,  or,  after  going  forth,  it  has  found  itself; 
through  the  stage  of  self-alienation  it  moves 
into  self -reconciliation  in  the  realm  of  Institu- 
tions. 

So  we  bring  to  an  end  this  account  of  actual- 
ized WiJl  as  the  direct  psychical  source  of  the  in- 
stitutional world.  Drawino;  an  analoo:y  from 
embryology,  we  may  call  it  the  psychical  em- 
bryo of  Institutions,  their  seed  in  the  soul  of 
man.  This  stage  we  must  distinguish  from  the 
Family,  which  is  the  institutional  embryo, 
that  IS  the  germinal  Institution  from  which  are 
derived  all  the  rest.  Or,  taking  the  illustration 
from  biology,  we  may  say  that  the  primal  psy- 
chical cell  of  Institutions  is  actualized  Will,  but 
the  primal  institutional  cell  itself  (which  is 
the  psychical  cell  in  its  first  actuality)  is  the 
Family.  The  reader  will,  of  course,  understand 
that  these  are  but  illustrations  of  the  thing,  not 
the  thing  itself,  which  is  not  a  physical  object 
but  the  Self,  Ego,  and  is  ultimately  to  be 
grasped  in  its  own  right,  as  it  is  in  itself,  and  not 
through  an  analogy  or  illustration.  Actualized 
"Will  is  a  thought,  which  is  finally  to  be  seized  in 
its  purit}",  that  is,  by  the  Thinking  which  creates 
it  purely. 

XII.  Historical.  Already  the  statement  has 
been  emphasized  that  the  present  work  makes  no 
claims  to  be  a  Sociology  in  the  ordinary  sense  of 
the  term.     To  be  sure,  it  is  our  opinion  that,  as 


INTBODUCTION.  39 

the  old  Political  Economy  has  broadened  itself 
out  into  Social  Science,  so  the  latter  will  have  to 
broaden  itself  out  into  Institutional  Science,  In 
fact,  sions  are  not  wanting'  that  this  movement 
has  already  begun.  Social  Science  cannot  know 
itself  without  knowing  at  the  same  time  State, 
Church  and  School. 

Sociology  traces  its  name  and  origin  to  Comte, 
who  places  it  at  the  culmination  of  his  six  great 
sciences.  With  him  it  clearly  depends  upon 
physical  science,  or  rather  is  a  physical  science; 
in  fact  he  seemed  more  inclined  at  one  time  to 
call  it  Social  Physics  than  Sociology,  and  made 
it  the  second  division  of  Organic  Physics,  of 
which  Physiology  (Biology )  Avas  the  first.  On 
the  same  general  line  Sociology  is  carried  for- 
ward by  Herbert  Spencer,  notwithstanding  his 
differences  from  Comte,  and  through  Spencer 
it  has  passed  down  to  the  present  time,  amid  a 
good  many  amplifications,  deflections  and  pro- 
tests. Nearly  all  recent  sociologists  unite  in  say- 
ing that  Sociology  must  take  Psychology  as  its 
starting-point  and  not  Biology ;  even  Spencer 
says  something  of  the  kind  i  n  spite  of  his  practice 
to  the  contrary.  But  when  we  come  to  look 
into  the  Psychology  of  the  sociologists,  we  find 
it  to  be  usually  Physiological  Psychology,  that 
is,  more  biological  than  psychological.  What, 
then,  is  gained  by  the  substitution?  Here,  in- 
deed, lies  one  of  the  main  diificulties  of    present 


40  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Sociolog'y ;  it  has  not  yet  found  out  quite  how 
to  set  itself  in  order.  The  result  is  its  votaries 
have  given  themselves  up  almost  wholly  to  experi- 
mentalism,  to  special  studies  of  small  patches 
which  at  last  form  monographic  mountains,  to 
unorganized  observations  which  constitute  an 
amorphous  undisciplined  mass  of  particulars,  at 
most  the  crude  materials  of  a  science  in  the 
future.  But  cannot  we  too  have  a  little  order  in 
our  present  life,  or  are  we  condemned  to  live  in 
everlasting  chaos  that  coming  generations  may 
enjoy  the  cosmos? 

We  confess  that  we  have  tried  to  run  a  new 
line  through  this  Science  of  Human  Association 
from  beginning  to  end,  a  line  that  does  not  pass 
through  Comte  and  his  successors,  though  the 
value  of  their  work  and  the  enormous  impe- 
tus given  by  them  to  the  study  of  Institutions 
must  be  always  duly  recognized.  This  line  prop- 
erly reaches  back  to  the  old  Greek  thinkers,  Plato 
and  Aristotle,  both  of  whom  have  left  great  insti- 
tutional works,  for  such  we  must  deem  Plato's 
liepubJic  and  Aristotle's  Politics.  Still  the}'  have 
no  completely  actualized  Institution  which  secures 
Free-Will,  since  both  disregard  it  in  imporant 
cases,  Plato  for  instance  by  his  communistic 
scheme  and  Aristotle  by  his  advocacy  of  slaver3\ 

Passing  at  once  to  the  great  thinkers  of  our 
own  age,  we  naturally  begin  Avith  Kant,  who  has 
had  a  profound  and  lasting  influence  upon  ]\Ioral 


INTRODUCTION.  41 

Science  but  who  never  rose  to  an  adequate  con- 
ception or  treatment  of  Institutional  Science. 
Fichte,  his  immediate  successor  and  the  promul- 
gator of  subjective  idealism,  could  not  by  means 
of  such  a  doctrine  do  much  with  objective  Insti- 
tutions, though  he  treated  of  them  in  different 
portions  of  his  career.  But  the  greatest  in  this 
German  series  is  Hegel,  who  has  more  pro- 
foundly expressed  and  developed  the  institu- 
tional idea  than  any  other  one  of  the  world- 
famous  thinkers.  This  is  specially  seen  in  that 
part  of  his  system  which  he  calls  Objective 
Spirit,  and  which,  in  our  opinion,  is  the  most 
fruitful  portion  of  his  philosophy. 

Thus  we  draw  our  institutional  line  through 
Hegel  from  whom  are  derived  most  valuable 
thoughts  and  suggestions.  He  calls  the  State 
"the  actuality  (WirkUchkeit)  of  the  substan- 
tial Will,  "  and  again  "  the  actualization  (  Fe?'- 
wirklichung)  of  freedom."  (Phil  des  liechts  s. 
306  and  311.)  What  use  we  make  of  this 
thought  has  already  appeared  and  will  continue 
to  appear  throughout  the  present  book.  But 
here  we  have  to  note  his  limitation.  He  applies 
this  thought  to  the  State,  but  not  to  the  whole 
institutional  world,  not  even  to  the  entire  sphere 
of  the  Secular  Institution,  at  least  not  clearly  and 
distinctly.  Still  further,  Hegel  has  no  devel- 
oped Religious  Institution  and  no  dcnelopcd 
Educative     Institution      organically     connected 


42  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

with  his  system.  Both  must  be  added  to  and 
unfolded  from  the  germinal  thouo-ht  which  he 
has  given.  He  has  devoted  a  large  work  to  Eelig- 
ion  as  such,  but  in  that  work  the  Religious  Insti- 
tution has  a  very  subordinate  part,  though  it 
certainly  appears.  He  discusses  the  Church  in 
some  paragraphs  externally  appended  to  his 
treatise  on  the  State  (see  Phil.  desRechts,  s.  325), 
which  fact  shows  it  to  have  no  place  in  his  organ- 
ized system  of  Institutions.  As  to  education, 
he  has  many  weighty  remarks  about  it  scattered 
throughout  his  works,  but  no  Educative  Insti- 
tution. 

The  science  of  Institutions,  therefore,  after 
developing  into  and  through  Hegel,  must  again 
emphatically  develop  out  of  him.  Such  is  the 
highest  use  to  which  he  or  any  great  thinker  can 
be  put.  He  is  not  to  be  battered  down  by 
argumentation  from  without  directed  against  him, 
but  is  to  be  unfolded  from  the  inside  into  a 
higher  reality.  The  great  thinker  usually  suffers 
a  double  mistreatment  —  from  his  foes  and  from 
his  friends;  but  he  is  not  to  be  externally  refuted 
by  the  one  set,  nor  is  he  to  be  internally  crystal- 
lized by  the  other.  AVhat  Hegel  saj's  he  did 
to  or  rather  did  for  Spinoza,  must  be  done  for 
Hegel  himself.  He  states  that  he  "  elevated 
Spinoza's  doctrine  of  Substance  into  the  higher 
point  of  view,''  and  did  not  undertake  to  refute 
it  as  a  false  system.      Ho    made  it   generate  the 


INTRODUCTION.  43 

Conception  ( Begriff) ,  which  was  his  own  higher 
doctrine.  Thus  he  connects  the  movement  of  his 
own  thought  with  that  of  Spinoza  (see  his  Logik, 
s.  9-11)  and  also  with  that  of  Kant.  Such 
is  Hegel's  principle,  that  of  development,  and 
certainly  he  is  not  to  be  excluded  from  the  work- 
ing of  his  own  principle.  The  philosophic  blight 
comes  w^hen  the  disciple  turns  literalist,  rehears- 
ing the  categories  of  the  master  without  makinof 
them  over  into  himself  and  transcending  them. 
And  we  may  add  that  Hegel's  dialectical  method 
must  also  be  transformed  and  become  a  psj^cho- 
logical  method,  before  it  can  be  emploj-ed  for 
the  science  of  Institutions,  as  the  latter  is  here 
conceived.  For  such  a  purpose  the  psycliical 
process  itself  must  be  taken;  that  is,  the  inher- 
ent process  of  the  Self  alone  can  penetrate  and 
order  the  works  of  the  Self,  to  which  Institutions 
belong.  An  alien  physical  or  metaphysical 
method  can  never  fraternize  with  or  even  reach 
into  the  institutional  soul  and  its  movement. 
Only  that  within  us  which  is  like  Institutions 
can  assimilate  them.  The  psychical  process 
above  mentioned,  which  moves  through  and 
organizes  the  institutional  world  we  have  already 
designated  as  the  Psychosis.  (For  a  fuller  treat- 
ment of  this  subject,  we  may  be  permitted  to 
refer  to  our  special  work.  Psychology  and  (he 
P.syr/iosis,  Introduction,  et  passim). 


SE  C  TION    FIRS  T.  —  THE    8E  C  ULAE 
INSTITUTION'. 

The  sphere  of  Social  Institutions  begins  with 
what  we  here  call  the  Secular  Institution,  or  the 
secular  institutional  world,  which  has  three  main 
forms — Family,  Society,  State.  The  idea  of 
secularity  is,  in  general,  the  idea  of  terrestrial 
existence ;  it  suggests  that  which  belongs  to  life 
here  and  now ;  it  pertains  to  the  temporal 
element,  rather  than  to  the  eternal,  wherein  lies 
an  implied  contrast  with  the  Keligious  Institu- 
tion. 

The  Secular  Institutions  (for  we  shall  also  use 
the  plural  to  indicate  the  di^dsions)  are  not  Per- 
sons, cannot  be  called  Egos,  though  they  be 
forms  of  Free- Will  actualized,  whose  end  is 
ultimately  to  secure  Free-\Yill.  Family,  Society* 
(44) 


THE  SECULAB  INSTITUTION.  45 

State,  though  not  Persons,  may  be  called  Per- 
sonifications in  the  strict  sense  of  the  term ;  they 
are  made  by  the  Person  to  act  as  a  Person  in 
Avilling  Free- Will.  The  essence  of  secularity  is 
the  individual  Self  institutionalized,  made  object- 
ive and  universal  —  a  Self  willing  the  freedom  of 
all  particular  Selves,  though  these  have  also  to 
will  it,  and  to  be  perpetually  re-creating  it  that 
they  all  be  free.  Herein  we  may  see  the  ground- 
plan  of  all  human  association. 

Thus  in  the  Secular  Institution  I  create  or 
re-create  the  universal  Will  or  Person  at  its  center, 
which  is  my  act  of  Personification  in  the  sense 
above  given.  But  in  the  Religious  Institution 
the  universal  Person  at  its  center  creates  me,  and 
the  whole  universe  besides  —  and  that  is  His  act 
of  Personification  (or  Person-making).  I  am 
to  submit  my  individual  AYill,  first  of  all,  to  His 
universal  Will,  which,  however,  is  to  will  my 
freedom . 

Manifestly  both  Institutions,  the  Secular  and 
the  Religious,  are  forms  of  actualized  Will  whose 
end  or  content  is  Free  Will,  hence  both  are 
classed  as  Institutions.  Yet  they  are  two  diverse, 
yea  two  opposite  forms  of  actualized  Will,  the 
one  coming  from  the  human  or  finite  Ego,  and 
the  other  coming  from  the  divine  or  absolute  Ego. 

The  general  movement,  accordingly,  of  the 
Secular  Institution  is  that  it  starts  with  the  in- 
dividual Will,  then  unfolds   into   the  objective 


4(3  .'SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

form  or  organism  of  itself,  which  is  Will  actual- 
ized and  at  work  in  the  world,  whose  end  is  to 
secure,  to  complete,  and  to  vivify  the  individual 
Will,  bringino; the  same  to  its  ultimate  fulfillment. 
Thus  the  Ego  as  Will  reaches  its  true  being  and 
enforces  itself  as  an  actual  existence,  at  the 
same  time  being  made  universal,  for  all. 

For  example.  Society  (as  the  Economic  Institu- 
tion) starts  with  the  individual  AVillintheformof 
appetite  or  bodily  need,  which  calls  forth  just 
this  Social  Order  or  Will  actualized  for  the  end 
of  satisfying  the  wants  of  the  body  and  other 
wants.  Thus  man  must  satisfy  his  appetite  not 
immediately,  but  through  the  Social  Institution, 
which  in  turn  is  evoked  just  through  his  wants, 
and  which  is,  therefore,  their  end,  or  the  ultimate 
ground  of  their  being.  That  is,  through  his 
wants  the  individual  is  compelled  to  be  social, 
to  make  Society,  to  live  a  universal  life  in  order 
to  exist  as  an  individual. 

The  Will  of  man  is,  in  the  first  place,  immedi- 
ate, gifted  with  the  power  of  objectifj'ing  itself, 
of  making  itself  into  something  outside  of  itself, 
which  act  is  the  primal  assertion  of  self.  Equally 
valid  is  the  second  stage  of  the  Will,  which  must 
be  able  to  suppress  itself,  to  hold  itself  back 
from  its  own  immediate  act,  Avhereby  it  separates 
within  from  itself,  and,  so  to  speak,  puts  down 
itself.  The  third  stage  shows  the  Will  in  full 
possession  of  itself  just  through  this  power  of 


THE  ISECULAR  INSTITUTION.  47 

self -suppression  ;  it  now  a.sserts  itself  not  imme- 
diately and  impulsively,  but  with. its  reserved 
strength  of  self-control, 

Tiie  foregoing  process  is  the  psychical  move- 
ment of  the  Ego  in  all  individual  Will,  which 
takes  the  form  of  Desire,  Impulse,  Motive. 
Every  Institution  starts  in  the  human  being 
with  some  Desire,  which  is  first  immediate,  sec- 
ondly is  inhibitory  of  itself,  then  thirdly  inhibits 
the  inhibition  and  returns  to  itself,  therein  at- 
taining to  mastery  of  Desire.  (For  a  fuller 
account  of  this  process  of  Desire  see  our  Will 
and  its  World,]).   105,   117,  etc.) 

Now  it  is  through  this  process  of  Desire  that 
the  individual  develops  into  and  participates  in 
the  institutional  world.  He  desires  a  loaf  of 
bread  which  is  the  })roperty  of  another,  so  he 
inhibits  his  immediate  Desire  or  Impulse  to 
seize  it  till  he  earns  it  and  receives  it  from  the 
Social  Whole,  through  which  he  inhibits  his  own 
inhibition  and  takes  the  bread.  Thus  his  indi- 
vidual Will,  here  his  Desire,  is  institutionalized, 
is  made  to  pass  through  the  social  alembic  before 
it  can  be  gratified.  In  this  way  all  Desires 
or  all  individual  Wills  can  be  satisfied  (relatively 
speaking)  by  first  satisfying  the  Institution 
(Society)  whose  function  is  just  to  satisfy  the 
individual  Will  in  the  form  of  Desire. 

In  like  manner  we  may  consider  sexual  Desire. 
As    immediate    or    as  natural  passion  it  nmst  be 


48  SOCIAL  ISSTITUTIONS. 

inhibited ;  but  this  inhibition  is  removed  through 
the  Institution,  the  Faniii}^  which  transfigures 
physical  Desire  into  domestic  Love.  Thus 
rises  out  of  the  sensuous,  immediate,  par- 
ticular Will  a  new  Will,  whose  end  is  to  bring 
forth  the  freedom  of  the  person  in  and 
throuo:h  the  Institution,  leading  all  individuals 
into  the  way  of  the  universal  life,  which  is 
institutional. 

The  preceding  process  also  includes  the  three 
grand  stages  of  "Will,  the  psychological,  the 
moral,  and  the  institutional.  The  immediate 
form  of  Will  is  purely  psychical  and  has  no  moral 
character;  but  when  the  inhibition  comes  in, 
morality  has  appeared,  for  I  suppress  my  imme- 
diate Desire  in  view  of  some  ideal  end  or  of  some 
duty ;  my  higher  self  perchance  puts  down  my 
lower  self.  Finally,  when  this  ideal  end  is  actual- 
ized in  an  Institution,  Ave  have  reached  the  grand 
culmination  of  the  movement  of  all  Will,  the  end 
which  includes  all  other  ends. 

The  Secular  Institution,  has,  accordingly,  to 
actualize  the  secular  Will  of  man,  to  transform 
the  immediate  sensuous  being  of  the  individual 
in  his  daily  life  and  occupations.  Secular 
existence  is  devoted  to  makino;  a  livins:,  to  raising 
a  family,  to  performing  the  duties  of  a  citizen, 
to  following  a  vocation.  Such  employments 
go  back  to  some  form  of  individual  Desire  which 
is  t®  be  elevated  and  made  institutional ;  whereby 


THE  SECULAR  INSTITUTION.  49 

not  one  man,  but  all  can  have  their  Desires  and  can 
be  therein  free,  of  course  through  the  Institution, 
whose  object  is  just  to  secure  this  freedom. 

Again  at  this  point  rises  the  contrast  between 
the  secular  and  the  religious  worlds.  St.  Crispin, 
making  a  shoe  and  selling  it  to  get  his  bread,  per- 
forms a  secular  act,  though  he  be  a  saint,  and  is 
through  such  an  act  a  member  of  the  Secular  Insti- 
tution.  But  St.  Crispin  making  a  shoe  and  giving 
it  to  the  poor  at  the  command  of  God  performs 
a  religious  act  and  is  a  member  of 'the  Religious 
Institution,  since  he  yields  up  his  own  immediate 
Will  and  its  product  to  another  Will,  the  highest, 
which  subordinates  his  shoemaking  to  quite  a  new 
end.  Now,  the  Saint's  Will  is  to  subject  itself 
and  all  its  works  to  the  Absolute  Will,  and  from 
this  act  of  self-renunciation  springs  his  religiosity, 
or  perchance  his  saintship. 

Still  we  must  see  that  the  Saint  also  just 
in  such  a  deed  has  fulfilled  his  individual  Desire, 
which  is  to  subject  his  individual  Desire  to 
the  Absolute  Will.  Thus  we  behold  the  dualism 
in  the  religious  Will  as  contrasted  with  the  sec- 
ular Will ;  the  one  actualizes  itself  in  an  Institu- 
tion which  vindicates  and  guarantees  the  individ- 
ual Will  as  such  (secular)  ;  but  the  other  actu- 
alizes itself  in  an  Institution  which  makes  valid 
the  subjection  of  the  individual  Will  through 
itself  (religious).  Still  we  are  to  see  that  both 
Institutions   have   the    one   great   ultimate    end 

4 


^(^  SOCIAL  lySTirUTIONS. 

which  makes  them  institutional;  both  are  actu- 
alized Free  AYill  which  wills  Free  "Will. 

Such  is  the  general  thought  of  the  Secular  Insti- 
tution as  actualized  Will,  which  is  now  to  be  seen 
unfolding  itself  into  Family,  Society,  State,  which 
are  not  passively  distinct,  but  are  in  a  process 
with  one  another.  All  these  Institutions  look 
after  the  reproduction  of  the  Person,  the  exist- 
ence and  the  perpetuity  of  the  Self,  which  is  the 
sacred  thing,  or  when  more  profoundly  seen  into, 
is  the  only  thing  in  this  universe.  The  Person 
must  first  Je  (through  the  Family),  then  must 
live  (through  Society),  finally  must  live  free 
(through  the  State).  Deeply  inter-connected 
are  these  three  Institutions,  forming,  as  it  were, 
a  triple  interlinking  chain  of  three  psychical 
rings  —  each  a  Psychosis  in  itself,  yet  all  three 
toofether  a  Psvchosis. 

Before  passing  to  the  special  treatment  of 
each,  we  shall  seek  to  emphasize  their  salient 
characteristics,  as  well  as  their  unity,  by  way  of 
introduction,  hoping  thereby  to  impress  upon 
the  mind  of  the  reader  in  advance  their  inter- 
connection, which  is  the  main  purpose  of  the 
present  exposition. 

I.  The  Family.  This  is  the  Institution  whose 
end  is  to  secure  the  Eeproduction  of  the  Person 
simply  and  immediatel3%  as  a  total  individual. 
Through  this  Institution  the  individual  is  first 
brousht  into  the  institutional  world,  and  is  reared 


THE  SECULAR  INSTITUTION.  51 

to  participate  in  the  same.  Through  the  Family 
the  human  being  begins  to  exist  by  the  deed  and 
care  of  others,  the  parents,  and  from  this  purely 
external  starting-point  he  enters  the  long  road  of 
his  unfolding  into  a  free  man.  The  Family, 
then,  is  that  form  of  actualized  "Will  whose  object 
is  to  bring  forth  into  the  world  a  Free  Will, 
creatino-  the  same  in  a  Person  and  starting  it  off 
on  its  career  of  self -development.  Thus  in  the 
Family  also  we  must  see  the  Institution  as  actual- 
ized Free  Will,  whose  ultimate  end  is  to  secure 
Free  Will,  in  the  present  case  by  bringing 
it  into  existence,  that  is,  into  an  institutional 
existence. 

The  Family  is,  accordingly,  the  real  genus  or 
generic  principle  generating  and  thus  preserving 
humanity  in  its  infancy ;  it  is  the  Institution  as 
creative,  creating  the  individual  as  Person  and 
starting  him  in  his  physical  and  also  in  his  insti- 
tutional life.  But  it  is  also  the  creative  Institu- 
tion as  creative  of  all  other  Institutions,  carrying 
its  genetic  energy  through  the  whole  institutional 
world.  We  may  deem  it  the  primordial  institu- 
tional cell,  source  of  all  that  follow ;  it  is  truly 
the  potential  Institution  which  is  to  realize  itself 
in  the  forthcoming  development. 

II.  Society.  This  is  the  Institution  whose  end 
is  to  secure  the  Reproduction  of  the  Person  as 
physical  and  institutional  individual  through  him- 
self,   through   his  own   activity,    which    realizes 


52  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

itself  ill  property.  That  is,  the  individual  work- 
ing in  and  through  Society,  now  reproduces  him- 
self, his  own  body  primarily,  and  also  his  own 
environing  world  of  wealth  and  property.  Food, 
raiment,  and  shelter  come  to  him  not  imme- 
diately, but  through  the  Social  Institution, 
which,  however,  must  be  set  in  motion  by  his 
effort.  He  must  give  to  it  what  it  gives  back  to 
him.  The  Family  presents  to  him  (as  a  child) 
food,  raiment,  and  shelter,  without  his  own 
activity ;  Society  makes  such  a  present  to  him 
only  through  his  activity  in  some  form.  Thus 
the  social  gift  is  a  mediated  one,  while  the  do- 
mestic gift  is  an  immediate  one. 

Society  is  that  form  of  actualized  Will 
which  has  first  to  make  Free  Will  a  reality 
in  the  thing  or  in  the  material  realm  which 
thereby  becomes  Property.  Surrounding  the 
individual  everywhere  is  a  world  of  Property, 
which  is  the  existence  of  the  Person  in  the  mate- 
rial object.  Here  too  the  social  Institution  must 
be  seen  to  be  actualized  Free  Will,  whose  ultimate 
end  is  to  secure  Free  Will,  in  the  present  case 
by  guarding  the  life  of  the  individual  from  the 
many  vicissitudes  of  Nature. 

III.  The  State.  This  is  the  Institution  whose 
end  is  to  secure  the  Reproduction  of  the 
Person  through  the  universal  Will  in  the  form  of 
Law.  The  individual  working  in  and  through 
the    State,    is  under  the  protection  of  the  Law, 


THE  SECULAR  INSTITUTION.  53 

which  is  the  formulated  command  to  secure  his 
Will.  The  State  is,  then,  that  form  of  actual- 
ized Will,  which  explicitly  and  consciously  de- 
clares its  own  principle  of  actualized  Will  in  the 
Law.  The  Secular  Institution  becomes,  so  to 
speak,  conscious  of  itself  in  the  State,  and  also 
utters  that  consciousness  of  itself  in  its  ultimate 
end,  which  is  freedom.  For  in  the  State  man 
becomes,  or  is  to  become,  consciously  free,  free 
through  the  Law  and  Institution. 

The  State,  knowing  its  own  purpose  to  be 
actualized  Will  which  is  to  secure  Will,  can  now 
go  back  and  secure  Family  and  Society,  which 
are  otherwise  helpless  and  implicit  forms  of  ac- 
tualized Will.  This  fact  is  expressed  in  the 
usual  formula  that  the  function  of  the  State  is 
to  secure  Person  and  Property,  as  both  are  inse- 
cure without  the  State  returning  to  them  and 
safe-guarding  them  through  its  self-conscious 
purpose  uttered  in  the  Law. 

Such  are  the  three  forms  of  the  Secular  Insti- 
tution—  Family,  Society,  State.  In  all  three, 
as  above  formulated,  we  may  observe  the  com- 
mon end,  the  Reproduction  of  the  Person;  this 
Person  being  given  as  the  germ  or  the  potential 
unit  of  humanity,  is  to  be  unfolded  into  com- 
plete institutional  life.  But  the  Reproduction  of 
the  Person  takes  different  shapes  in  the  different 
Institutions ;  in  the  Family  he  is  immediately 
reproduced,    is   born   as  an  individual  Will;  in 


54  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Society  lie  is  reproduced  through  himself  in  the 
external  world,  which  he  appropriates  or  makes 
his  Property ;  in  the  State  he  is  reproduced  as 
willing  his  own  self -reproduction  in  the  Lair. 
Hence  the  Person  is  not  fully  reproduced  till  he 
develops  into  his  institutional  heritage,  taking  it 
up  into  his  spirit  and  making  it  internal.  In 
brief,  Ave  may  say  that  the  Person  is  born  in  the 
Family,  is  realized  (/'es,  thing)  in  Society,  and  is 
actualized  in  the  State  (acfus,  pertaining  to  the 
Will).  The  Secular  Institution,  accordingly, 
takes  the  seedling  Ego,  and  nurtures  it  into  the 
full  stature  of  the  Person  as  a  domestic,  social, 
and  political  being.  Thus  each  (the  Person  and 
the  Secular  Institution)  reproduces  the  other  in 
and  through  the  other. 

Nor  must  we  stop  with  conceiving  these  three 
forms  of  the  Secular  Institution  as  simply  united 
in  a  common  principle,  giving,  as  it  were,  a  fixed 
or  dead  result.  We  nmst  see  them  active,  and 
so  uniting  themselves  by  their  innermost  psychi- 
cal process,  which  is  the  Psychosis,  showing  the 
three  stages — immediate,  separative  and  return- 
ing. The  careful  reader  will  have  already  felt  or 
perchance  consciously  observed  this  movement 
in  the  preceding  exposition.  For  the  Family 
shows  the  Person  immediately  reproduced ; 
Society  shows  the  Person  separating  himself 
within  as  Will  and  externalizing  himself  as  Prop- 
erty ;  the  State  shows  the  Person  returning  uoon 


THE  SECULAR  INSTITUTION.  55 

himself  and  securing  himself  and  his  activity 
through  the  Law.  The  returning  principle  of 
the  State  we  can  see  expressed  in  the  formula : 
the  State  is  that  form  of  actualized  Will  whose 
end  is  to  secure  the  actualization  of  Will.  It  is 
the  Law  whose  content  is  to  safeguard  the  Will 
both  as  inner  Person  and  outer  Property,  and  it 
is  the  State  which  makes  and  administers  the 
Law.  We  may  add  here  that  the  Family  is  the 
immediate,  implicit,  potential  principle  out  of 
which  all  Institutions  unfold  as  their  germ,  as 
their  primal  reproductive  source;  it  generates 
not  only  Persons  but  Institutions. 

We  may  here  repeat  the  fact  that  each  form 
of  the  Secular  Institution  starts  with  the  indi- 
vidual Will  as  Desire.  The  sexual  appetite  pro- 
pels man  into  the  Family,  the  bodilj'  wants  call 
forth  the  Social  Order,  the  impulse  of  the  Will 
to  freedom  makes  for  the  State.  Now  all  these 
Desires  are  not  to  be  gratified  individually  and 
directly,  but  through  the  Institution.  Their 
immediate  gratification  would  be  destructive  of 
Free-Will  as  universal,  and  man  would  drop 
back  into  a  condition  of  violence.  Hence  the 
individual  Will  in  every  form  of  Desire  must  be 
institutionalized,  ere  even  the  purpose  of  that 
Desire  can  be  attained,  and  men  can  live  together 
in  freedom. 

But  just  at  this  point  the  element  negative  to 
the  Secular    Institution    and   to  all  Institutions 


56  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

enters  and  asserts  itself.  The  individual  Will 
by  virtue  of  its  freedom  can  refuse  to  be  insti- 
tutionalized, and  can  follow  its  own  immediate 
spontaneous  Desire,  which  destroys  the  freedom 
of  others.  Thus  a  destroying  principle  comes 
into  the  institutional  world  at  its  very  source, 
namely  the  individual  Will. 

Hence  each  Secular  Institution  will  have  within 
itself  a  descending  stream,  a  receding  movement 
which  tends  to  carry  it  back  to  the  beginning  in 
mere  individual  Desire,  and  thus  to  reduce  man 
to  barbarism.  All  modern  society  is  known  to 
have  this  retrogressive  current  in  its  bosom ; 
indeed  with  this  is  its  chief  battle.  Man  is  for- 
ever lapsing  from  civilization  to  savagery,  and 
the  migration  backwards  never  ceases. 

But  there  is  also  the,  counter  current,  the 
movement  forwards  out  of  savagery  to  civiliza- 
tion, which  is  just  the  advance  of  the  institutional 
world.  In  fact  we  must  see  that  the  mentioned 
descent  of  Institutions  is  not  only  the  counter- 
part but  the  necessary  condition  of  their  ascent ; 
the  two  are  parts  of  one  process.  Without  the 
fall,  there  can  be  no  rise ;  without  something  to 
overcome,  there  is  no  overcoming.  All  progress, 
all  evolution  has  in  it  a  negative  antecedent  or  co- 
efficient, which  is  not  to  be  left  out  of  the  account. 
History,  recording  construction  cannot  omit  de- 
struction without  destroying  itself.  And  in  the 
institutional  world,  alongside  of  human  ameliora- 


THE  SECULAR  INSTITUTION.  57 

tion  runs  a  strange  infernal,  Stygian  river  of 
human  deterioration.  Yet  both  are  factors  of 
the  one  vast,  all-encompassing  social  process, 
and  both  must  be  reckoned  with  in  any  com- 
plete exposition  of  the  present  theme. 

In  the  Family,  State,  and  Society,  therefore, 
we  must  expect  to  find  this  negative  movement, 
which  will  even  organize  itself  against  the  Insti- 
tution —  an  Institution  to  destroy  the  Institution. 
In  the  Family  there  will  be  a  reversion  to  mere 
sexual  appetite ;  in  Society  a  reversion*  to  pure 
individual  greed  manifested  alike  in  rich  and 
poor;  in  the  State  a  reversion  to  brute  Will 
whose  end  is  to  violate  Person  and  Property. 
The  result  is  that  inside  the  Institution  there  is 
a  grand  descent,  a  fall  backward  to  its  very 
beginninof. 

Accordingly  in  each  Secular  Institution  we  shall 
have  the  positive,  the  negative,  and  the  evolu- 
tionary stages,  which  together  make  its  constitu- 
tive process  as  a  form  of  actualized  Will. 

Once  more  we  may  glance  back  and  take  a 
brief  survey  of  the  three  Secular  Institutions 
apart  and  together.  Through  the  Family  the 
Person  gets  to  be,  through  Society  he  gets  to 
live,  through  the  State  he  gets  to  live  a  freeman. 
Thus  the  Secular  Institutions  give  birth,  main- 
tenance, freedom,  not  simply  as  natural,  but  as 
institutional.  Varying  the  expression  somewhat, 
we  may  say :   the  Family  wills  the  Free-Will  to 


58  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS, 

be  born,  Society  wills  the  Free-Will  to  be  sus- 
tained, the  State  wills  the  Free-AVill  to  be  Free- 
Will.  Thus  the  State  turns  back  to  the  others 
and  secures  them  along  with  itself  as  Free-Will. 
Here  it  may  be  well  to  repeat  once  more  that  the 
ideal  end  of  the  whole  institutional  world  is 
Free-Will  actualized,  or  the  more  and  more 
complete  actualization  of  freedom. 


CHAPTER  FIRST.—  THE  FAMILY. 

The  Family  has  long  been  recognized  in  a 
general  way  as  the  first  of  man's  Social  Institu- 
tions, foundation  and  source  of  the  rest.  We 
may  indeed  call  it  supremely  the  creative  Institu- 
tion, in  which  takes  place  the  genesis  of  both 
man  and  of  his  Institutions.  It  is  the  primordial 
genetic  unit,  out  of  which  are  born  both  the 
Person  and  the  Institutional  World,  or  the  indi- 
vidual subjective  Self  and  the  universal  objective 
Self  (as  Institution). 

We  must  not,  however,  forget  its  immediate 
psychical  starting-point,  which  is  the  Will,  in  the 
present  case  the  Will  as  sexual  desire,  which 
drives  man  into  the  Family.  But  this  Will  as 
desire  has  as  its  ideal  end  freedom  or    Frec-Will 


60  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

which  actuahzes  itself  in  an  Institution,  primarily 
that  of  the  Famil}^  whose  lower  forms  may  be 
simply  Will  actuahzed,  but  whose  destiny  is  to 
be  Free-Will  actualized,  that  is,  an  existent,  objec- 
tive Free-Will  which  secures  Free- Will  in  all  the 
members  of  the  Family- 

The  Family  is  that  Institution  which  brings  a 
Free-Will  into  existence,  not  only  physically  but 
morally  and  intellectually ;  it,  therefore,  can  be 
seen  to  be  an  actualized  Free-Will  itself,  that 
is,  a  Free-Will  existent,  objective,  whose  end 
is  to  will  Free-Will.  This  does  not  mean  that 
such  an  end  always  lies  consciously  in  the  parent 
of  every  child,  though  it  may  in  certain  cases. 
But  in  general,  the  Family  being  the  primary 
Institution,  has  the  institutional  end  as  implicit, 
unconscious,  potential;  as  instinct,  as  emotion, 
as  love.  The  individual  through  love  becomes  a 
member  of  the  domestic  Institution,  and  sur- 
renders himself  to  its  end  ;  yet  in  this  self -sur- 
render he  wins  his  freedom. 

The  physical  presupposition  of  the  Family  is 
the  sexual  individual,  in  whom  is  manifested 
Nature's  deepest  dualism,  that  of  sex.  At  the 
same  time  the  sexual  individual  longs  to  transcend 
his  half  ness  and  to  become  whole  through  one  of 
the  opposite  sex.  Thereby  he  shows  himself  as 
generic  or  generative  —  not  merely  individual  but 
also  species,  reproducing  himself  as  individual. 
Thus  he  is    not  merely  a  man,  but  ideally  man- 


THE  FAMILY.  61 

kind.  Upon  this  ideal  element  in  sex  the  do- 
mestic Institution  is  built,  and  domestic  love  has 
in  it  the  double  ingredient,  physical  and  institu- 
tional. 

The  end  of  the  Family,  then,  as  actualized 
Free-Will,  is  the  reproduction  of  the  human  indi- 
vidual as  a  new  Free-Will  in  the  world.  In  and 
through  the  Family  the  child  is  to  be  begotten, 
to  have  nurture  (both  pre-natal  and  post-natal), 
and  to  receive  its  first  education,  till  the  Educa- 
tive Institution  can  take  it  and  carry  forward  its 
training;.  Through  the  Institution  of  the  Familv 
the  child  is  not  simply  born,  but  is  born  into  the 
world  of  Institutions,  and  begins  its  career  as  an 
institutional  being. 

The  destiny  of  the  child  is  to  become  an  inde- 
pendent individual,  specially  independent  of  the 
Family  which  has  reared  him.  Thus  the  Family, 
starting  with  the  individual,  has  returned  to  the 
same,  being  the  instrument  of  his  re-creation. 
But  this  independent  individual  must  in  turn 
enter  the  Family  and  re-create  that ;  therein  he 
wills  into  existence  that  Institution  which  has 
willed  him  into  existence.  With  such  a  content 
in  his  life  he  is  truly  ethical,  possessing  and  prac- 
ticing the  primary  institutional  virtue. 

Biologically  the  Family  has  a  close  correspond- 
ence with  the  plant,  which  starts  with  the  seed, 
blooms  and  unfolds  into  stem,  flower,  fruit,  and 
then   returns    to   the    seed,    its    starting-point. 


62  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS.       ' 

Such  is  the  vegetable  cycle  of  Reproduction, 
which  bears  such  a  striking  analogy  to  the  domes- 
tic cycle,  beginning  with  the  reproductive  indi- 
vidual and  returning  to  the  same,  not  simply 
through  Nature  however,  but  through  the  Insti- 
tution. If  the  Family  corresponds  to  the  plant. 
Society  bears  more  resemblance  to  the  animal, 
and  the  State  has  its  likeness  to  the  Ego, 
being  the  self-conscious  Institution. 

Thus  the  Family  is  to  institutionalize  or  make 
ethical  the  sexual  individual.  Starting^  with  de- 
sire,  he  is  not  to  gratify  it  immediately,  but 
through  the  Institution.  He  must  inhibit  sexual 
propensities  till  they  be  transformed  by  their 
institutional  end  in  the  Family.  Sensuality  de- 
stroys the  Family  on  one  side,  celibacj'  destroys 
it  also  on  the  other ;  indulgence  and  prohibition 
can  be  equally  negative  to  domestic  life. 

Every  human  being  is  (or  ought  to  be)  born 
into  the  Family,  and  consequently  born  to  repro- 
duce it,  when  he  completes  himself.  He  can 
only  actualize  himself  as  an  institutional  person 
through  the  Family ;  to  be  completely  himself  he 
must  reproduce  his  origin,  and  generate  his  own 
process  in  other  individuals,  who  are  to  be  insti- 
tutional like  himself. 

The  man  and  the  woman,  being  distinct  and 
separate  by  Nature,  become  spiritually  one  in  the 
Family,  which,  though  not  a  Person  or  an  Ego, 
has  nevertheless  a  kind  of  Personalitv,   being  a 


THE  FAMILY.  63 

Will  over  both,  to  which  both  have  to  subject 
themselves  in  order  to  get  and  to  beget  them- 
selves, thus  attaining  their  true  destiny  in  that 
higher  unity  out  of  which  both  of  them  sprang. 
In  the  Family  they  share  in  a  loftier  Personality 
which  is  much  more  than  either  of  them  alone, 
for  through  it  both  are  endowed  with  the  ability 
to  re-create  and  perpetuate  themselves  physically 
and  spiritually — a  new  immortality  —  at  the 
same  time  re-creating  and  perpetuating  that 
loftier  Personality  itself  through  their  active 
participation. 

The  Family  does  not  rest  on  purchase,  though 
the  wife  may  once  have  been  bought  directly, 
and  indirectly  may  be  still  (at  present  the  hus- 
band is  oftener  bought).  The  Family  is  not  a 
contract,  though  contract  may  enter  as  one  of 
its  relations  to  external  affairs.  The  Famil}^  we 
must  repeat,  is  an  Institution,  the  earliest  form 
of  actualized  Free-Will  whose  end  is  to  secure 
and  to  produce  Free-Will. 

The  human  being  (man  and  woman)  has  to 
belong  to  the  Family  and  to  keep  up  its  process, 
in  order  to  be  completely  himself,  that  is,  in 
order  to  be  an  objective,  actual  Self,  in  possession 
of  his  own  creative  power.  He  may  hold  aloof 
from  the  Family,  but  then  he  is  not  actually  insti- 
tutional ;  his  life  is  but  partial  without  its  domestic 
integrity.  Thus  the  Family,  while  its  end  is  the 
physical  and  spiritual  reproduction  of  the  indi- 


64  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS, 

vicinal  as  a  member  of  the  human  race,  at  the 
same  time  makes  the  life  of  us  all  truly  rational, 
an  actuality.  For  the  rational  person  exists 
actually  only  in  so  far  as  he  is  creative,  yea  self- 
creative,  reproducing  himself  as  rational,  and 
such  he  can  be  only  through  the  Family.  His 
physical  Self  he  may  indeed  reproduce  outside 
the  Family,  for  he  too  is  an  animal,  but  not  his 
spiritual,  institutional  Self,  not  his  totality  mor- 
ally and  intellectually  as  well  as  physically. 

Of  course  there  are  other  Institutions  besides 
the  Family,  other  forms  of  actualized  Will, 
which  are  to  be  hereafter  unfolded.  But  the 
Family  is  what  makes  the  human  individual  truly 
appear,  giving  him  to  the  world,  yea  to  himself. 
The  Family  thus  is  supremely  the  first  giver  of 
man,  who  in  the  Family  is  a  given  object,  even 
a  present  unto  himself.  To  be  sure,  he  must 
move  out  of  this  given,  passive  state,  and  become 
himself  also  the  giver  of  himself.  In  Society 
we  shall  tiiid  that  he  must  be  active  and  must 
labor,  in  order  to  rehabilitate  his  own  body,  which 
he  has  to  be  alwavs  criving  to  himself. 

In  the  Family  we  have,  accordingly,  the  fol- 
lowing process:  (a)  the  sexual  individual,  en- 
dowed with  his  immediate  natural  Will  or  Desire ; 
(6)  the  Institution,  which  unites  and  subjects 
the  two  sexes  as  separate  individual  Wills,  in  a 
higher  actualized  Will  whose  end  is  (c)  the 
reproduction  of  the  individual,  who  is  to  be  un- 


THE  FAMILY.  65 

folded  till  he  be  ready  to  go  through  the  same 
cycle.  In  this  movement  we  see  that  a  certain 
phase  of  the  individual  Will  (sexual)  actualizes 
itself  in  the  corresponding  Institution  (Family), 
and  through  the  latter  returns  to  itself  in  the 
offspring,  the  new  individual,  in  whom  the 
parents  may  well  behold  their  seemingly  realized 
immortality,  though  this  alas!  sometimes  van- 
ishes before  their  eyes.  But  through  the  Family 
the  human  individual  asserts  himself  as  universal, 
generic,  reproducing  not  only  his  own  body  but 
his  own  soul  aloug  with  all  the  possibilities  of 
the  race.  He  vindicates  his  power  to  be  not 
merely  himself,  limited  within  himself,  but 
creative  of  Self,  a  new  center  of  creation,  ful- 
filling therein  his  divine  destiny.  Thus  he  is 
the  universal  man,  generic,  the  actual  objective 
genus  homo,  not  the  potential  subjective  one, 
having  actualized  himself  through  the  Family. 

We  may  re-think  briefly  the  various  characteris- 
tics of  the  Family  in  the  following  statement.  It 
is  an  Institution,  being  actualized  Free-Will, 
which  wills  Free-Will  by  reproducing  the  Person ; 
it  is  secular,  and  not  religious,  as  this  Institu- 
tion does  not  demand  the  subordination  of  the 
human  individual  Will  directly  to  the  absolute 
Will,  though  the  Family,  like  the  other  secular 
Institutions,  has  its  religious  side;  it  is  the^rs^ 
Institution,  since  the  institutional  world  must 
start   with   the   human   individual,  and  it  is  the 

5  ^ 


0(5  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Family  which  brings  into  existence  this  starting 
point,  namely  the  human  individual,  and  gives 
to  him  his  first  training  to  an  institutional 
life. 

In  another  sense  we  may  regard  the  Family  as 
the  first  Institution.  It  contains  implicitly  all 
the  Institutions  which  are  to  follow  —  social, 
political,  religious,  educative.  It  is  the  primal 
institutional  germ  or  potentiality  which  is  to 
develop  into  separate  forms  —  a  fact  to  be  noted 
both  in  its  thought  and  in  its  history.  A  do- 
mestic stage  we  shall  find  in  Societv,  State, 
Religion  and  Education,  which,  however,  is  not 
permanent,  but  develops  out  of  its  infantile  con- 
dition. 

We  shall  now  seek  to  unfold  the  process  of 
the  Domestic  Institution,  which  will  reveal  the 
movement  of  the  Ego  in  its  three  stages.  Hence 
we  shall  look  at  the  Family  ordering  itself  pri- 
marily through  the  psychical  movement. 

I.  The  Positive  Family;  this  shows  the  Insti- 
tution, as  it  is,  immediately;  we  wish,  first  of  all, 
to  grasp  the  Family  in  its  present  state  of  devel- 
opment, as  far  as  this  has  gone  among  the  most 
advanced  peoples.  Hence  we  here  give  the  con- 
ception of  the  monogamous  Family,  which,  how- 
ever, has  preserved  in  it  deeply  negative  elements. 
These  are  perpetually  dissolving  it  anew,  reducing 
it  to  the  beginnino;.  So  we  have  the  counter 
process. 


THE  FAMILY.  <'>7 

II.  The  Negafii-e  Fanulij;  this  brings  to  the 
surface  the  stream  which  is  always  running  in 
opposition  to  the  Positive  Family,  showing  the 
tendency  to  revert  to  former  and  lower  stages  of 
the  Domestic  Institution.  Thus  the  Family  di- 
vides within  itself  into  two  currents,  one  back- 
ward and  one  forward,  the  regressive  and  the 
progressive.  It  is  the  fall  or  the  descent  of  the 
Family  ffoing;  back  to  the  beginning  in  the  indi- 
vidual  of  Nature,  who  becomes  emptied  of  his 
whole  institutional  content.  But  this  is  also  the 
point  of  ascent,  from  which  man  rose  and  evolved 
the  Domestic  Institution  as  it  exists  to-day. 

III.  The  Evolution  of  the  Family;  this  will 
show  the  historic  unfolding  of  the  Family, 
which,  however,  proceeds  in  psychical  order. 
Here  we  observe  the  return  out  of  separation  and 
descent;  man  is  seen  overcoming  the  negative 
element  which  whirls  him  downwards.  All 
Evolution  is  the  transcending  of  limits  which  have 
become  repressive  and  hence  destructive.  In  the 
present  case  the  evolutionary  goal  is  the  ideal  of 
the  Family,  which  is  always  insisting  on  a  more 
perfect  realization  in  new  forms. 

Evolution,  then,  is  only  one  phase  or  stage  in 
the  total  process  of  the  Family.  In  like  manner 
we  shall  find  that  Evolution  does  not  embrace  the 
whole  science  of  Institutions;  there  must  be  its 
counterpart,  a  devolution  or  descent,  to  make  it 
possible.     Also  there  must  be  that  from  which 


C8  .SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

U  the  descent  as  well  as  that  toward  which  is  the 
ascent,  in  order  to  have  the  whole  process.  So 
we  start  from  and  return  to  the  Positive  Family. 
Such  is  the  general  movement  of  the  Family, 
which  will  be  found  to  be  in  correspondence  with 
that  of  the  other  social  Institutions.  Before 
plunging  into  details,  it  is  well  for  us  to  re- 
call the  unitary  principle  Avhich  weaves  through 
and  connects  the  whole.  The  Family,  springing 
from  the  Will,  Avhich  is  itself  a  phase  or  an 
activity  of  the  Ego,  gets  its  organizing  process 
from  the  Psychosis,  whose  threefold  movement 
throws  its  search-light  over  the  grand  sweep  of 
the  total  Institution,  as  well  as  into  every  little 
corner  of  the  household.  This  is  the  genetic 
thread  which  the  earnest  reader  is  to  be  contin- 
ually reproducing  in  himself  as  he  follows  the 
course  of  the  succeeding  exposition,  since  thus  he 
is  ideally  re-creating  the  Family. 


I.  The  Positive  Family. 

Our  first  attempt  will  be  to  grasp  the  elements 
of  the  Family  as  they  exist  before  us,  imme- 
diately ;  to  give  its  process  as  we  behold  it  every 
day.  This  we  call  its  positive  side  or  phase,  in 
contrast  to  the  negative  or  destructive  elements, 
which  are  likewise  at  M'ork  continually  in  the 
Domestic  Institution.     Or   we  mig-ht  name  this 


TEE  FAMILY.  69 

first  phase  the  conception  or  idea  of  the  Family, 
in  so  far  as  it  has  unfolded  into  present  reality. 
Thus  we  seek  to  give  the  norm  of  the  Family  or 
the  normal  Family. 

As  we  shall  see  later,  it  has  taken  the  race  a 
long  time  to  reach  this  point.  For  the  people  of 
the  Occident,  the  monogamous  principle  of  the 
Family  is  the  valid  one,  which,  however,  has 
been  evolved  through  the  ages.  Among  most  of 
the  civilized  peoples  of  Asia,  polygamy  maiirtains 
its  hold,  but  even  there  it  is  said  to  be  declining. 

In  the  positive  process  of  the  Family  we  shall 
note  three  leading  stages :  the  sexual  pair  must 
get  married,  must  found  u  home,  and  should 
realize  themselves  in  the  child,  which  is  the  aim 
and  end  of  the  Institution.  So  we  have  the  three 
following  stages  of  the  Positive  Family  which 
constitute  its  process  :  — 

I.  Marriage;  this  may  be  deemed  the  birth 
of  the  Family  through  the  love  of  the  sexual 
pair,  which  love,  however,  must  have  the^triple 
Confirmation,  ere  it  find  its  full  fruition  in  the 
Domestic  Institution. 

II.  The  Home;  this  arises  primarily  from  the 
separation  of  the  pair  from  their  respective 
households,  and  the  formation  of  a  new  one, 
their  own  Home,  which  reveals  its  inherent  char- 
acter in  a  triple  Domestication. 

III.  The  Child;  this  is  the  end  and  actualit\' 
of  the  new  Family,  which  brings  into  the  world 


70  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIONS. 

a  new  Free- Will,  or  the  possibility  thereof,  and 
thus  shows  itself  as  the  preserver  of  the  race  and 
its  Institutions. 

In  the  preceding  process  we  may  see  the  Fam- 
ily horn  through  Marriage,  realized  through  the 
Home,  actualized  through  the  Child,  who  is  po- 
tentially at  least  a  Free- Will  whose  destiny  is  to 
Avill  Free  Will,  or  one  who  is  to  become  a  free 
man.  Thus  is  the  Family  truly  an  Institution, 
an  actualized  Will  which  is  to  secure  Will  by 
bringing  it  into  existence  and  thereby  to  perpet- 
uate it.  The  birth  of  the  Child  is  a  Will  new- 
born, which  means  a  new  creative  center  in  the 
universe.  These  outlines  we  shall  fill  up  with  the 
more  important  details. 

I.  ]\Iarriage.  There  are  many  gradations  of 
Marriage,  as  is  only  too  well  known;  still  in  every 
soul  which  can  be  called  institutional  there  is  an 
ideal  of  married  life,  a  sense  of  what  constitutes 
its  completeness.  It  is  not  to  be  merely  a  phy- 
sical union,  not  to  be  merely  a  legal  union, 
though  it  has  its  physical  side  and  must  be  ac- 
cording to  law ,  nor  is  it  to  be  simply  a  partner- 
ship for  some  external  purpose  (niariage  de  con- 
venance),  nor  simply  an  emotional  union  de- 
pendent on  the  whiffs  of  caprice. 

Marriage  is  to  possess  the  stability  of  the  in- 
stitutional world  itself,  and  is  to  be  dissolved 
only  in  order  to  protect  the  Institution  of  the 
Family  as  a  whole.     An  eternal  element  lies  with- 


THE  FAMILY.  71 

ill  it,  which  is  to  be  secured  by  three  Confir- 
mations—  a  personal,  a  civil,  and  a  religious 
Confirmation.  The  Individual,  the  State  and 
Religion  are  all  to  put  their  seal  upon  Marriage, 
participating  in  it  and  confirming  it  with  their 
respective  sanctions.  Earth  and  Heaven  as  well 
as  the  human  Soul  o-et  married  in  the  ]\Iarriao^e 
of  man  and  woman.  This  fact  is  to  be  considered 
more  fully. 

I.  The  Inner  Confirmation.  The  union  of  the 
sexual  pair  must  be  first  internal,  before  it  can 
be  made  external,  acknowled_o-ed,  and  confirmed 
before  the  whole  wtrld.  This  subjective  side  of 
the  Family  is  its  originative  starting-point;  from 
the  depths  of  the  soul  springs  an  inner  inclina- 
tion which  fuses  the  two  individuals  into  one  life 
and  one  hope  as  well  as  into  one  purpose  of  ex- 
istence. The  Ego,  penned  up  within  its  own 
walls,  finds  itself  alone,  and  of  its  own  nature 
breaks  forth  and  seeks  to  be  itself  through  an- 
other. Such  is  the  primal  act  of  Lovet  the 
individual  sacrifices  himself  to  and  for  another, 
and  thereby  regains  himself.  The  Self  refuses 
to  exist  solely  for  itself ;  Love  first  compels  it 
to  renounce  selfishness  and  to  attain  selfhood 
through  another  Self. 

Love  is  the  primary,  instinctive,  most  natural 
appearance  of  the  institutional  element  in  human 
nature.  It  is  a  personal  feeling,  yet  a  personal 
feeling  which  subordinates    every  other  personal 


72  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

feelino;  to  itself.  Thus  it  commands  the  individ- 
ual,  and  this  command  is  so  compelling  that  it 
seems  some  objective  power  which  rules  the  soul. 
Yet  it  is  the  soul's  own  supreme  gift,  which  de- 
mands not  only  gratification  but  re-creation. 
Love  is  the  primal  manifestation  of  the  Self  as 
generic,  and  means  not  simply  this  individual's 
passion,  but  ideally  the  whole  human  race,  the 
genus  homo.  The  individual  is  literally  to  im- 
mortalize himself  through  Love,  for  as  individual 
he  is  bound  to  perish,  but  as  species  he  perpetu- 
ates himself,  makes  himself  eternal. 

Man  and  woman,  then,  are  the  two  individuals, 
w^ho  in  their  rigid,  mutually  excluding  limits  are 
to  be  smelted  into  a  new  unity  by  the  fires  of 
Love,  till  each  receives  and  acknowledges  the 
inner  Confirmation  of  this  unity  as  lasting. 
Whereof  we  note  the  following  process. 

(1)  Rising  out  of  our  unconscious  life  comes 
an  inclination  which  gradually  or  perchance  quite 
suddenly  shapes  itself  into  a  conscious  selection  of  a 
person  of  the  opposite  sex.  Vision  usually  starts 
this  activity,  but  it  is  the  soul  which  chooses  just 
the  one  out  of  many.  Why?  From  some  innate 
congruity  or  fore-ordained  harmony  of  natures, 
it  is  often  said ;  at  least  here  is  the  transition  out 
of  the  unconscious  into  the  conscious ;  Love  steps 
from  behind  its  impenetrable  veil  and  asserts  itself 
in  a  personal  preference ;  before  this  choice  it 
was  merely  the  possibility   of  choice  and  hence 


THE  FAMILY.  78 

unfathomable.  The  soul  in  the  present  relation 
might  be  defined  as  the  potentiality  of  all  Love, 
which,  however,  is  called  forth  into  reality  by  the 
presence  of  the  right  person.  What  brings  the 
two  together?  Accordino;  to  the  ancients  this 
was  the  work  of  the  God,  Aphrodite,  Cupid,  Eros ; 
at  any  rate  Love  has  this  element  of  external  de- 
termination, which  lends  to  it  what  is  often 
deemed  its  pre-destined  or  God-sent  character. 
But  still  more  decisively  does  it  possess  an  inner 
self -unfolding  power,  which  is  evoked  by  suit- 
able stimulation ;  the  soul  is  Love  as  God  is  Love. 

(2)  But  Love  is  twofold,  there  must  be  two 
parties,  who  show  a  mutual  emotion.  Two  Loves 
there  are,  separate,  individual  in  their  origin,  yet 
these  two  are  in  order  to  be  one.  The  tie  must 
be  reciprocal,  each  must  sacrifice  himself  and 
herself  in  order  to  regain  the  Self  which  is  the 
unity  of  both  through  both,  and  out  of  which  the 
Institution  is  to  develop. 

But  just  here  lies  the  possibility  of  separation, 
of  the  inner  conflict  of  Love.  The  emotion  may 
not  be  reciprocal,  there  may  be  the  sacrifice  of 
the  one  Self  without  the  response  of  the  other. 
Thus  there  is  the  surrender  without  the  media- 
tion through  the  other ;  the  result  is  that  deep 
inner  scission  in  the  soul  which  is  known  as  un- 
requited Love.  It  is  one  of  the  most  common 
themes  of  Literature,  since  every  human  heart 
has    had    some   touch    of  this  pang,  which  has 


74  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

indeed  manifold  sources  and  forms,  and  which 
has  been  wrought  over  and  over  into  song,  son- 
net, drama,  opera,  novel.  Apparently  sunny 
Italy  has  been  most  susceptible  to  this  phase  of 
Love's  conflict,  which  has  been  fervidly  uttered 
by  Petrarch  (Laura)  and  by  Dante  (Beatrice), 
and  also  by  Shakespeare  in  Romeo  and  Juliet, 
that  marvelous  Italian  echo  in  Eno:lish. 

(3)  The  scission  is  healed  by  the  betrothal. 
Each  is  made  conscious  of  the  other's  devotion, 
gives  and  receives  the  pledge  of  fidelity.  This 
pledge  afiirms  the  permanent  nature  of  their 
emotion,  Avhich  is  the  basic  principle  of  the  In- 
stitution. When  both  have  acknowledged  the 
eternal  element  in  their  inclination,  it  is  ready  to 
be  made  real,  to  pass  out  of  its  subjective  state 
into  the  objective  Institution,  which  calls  up  a 
new  Confirmation. 

2.  Tlie  External  Confirmation.  To  give  valid- 
ity to  the  permanent  element  of  Love,  which,  as 
already  said,  is  the  institutional  element  of  the 
Family,  this  is  to  be  acknowledged  and  confirmed 
by  the  institutional  world.  As  the  new  Family 
is  a  secular  Institution,  the  realm  of  secular  In- 
stitutions is  to  recognize  and  to  receive  it,  thus 
making  it  a  part  of  itself. 

(1)  The  respective  Families  of  the  betrothed 
have  a  certain  right  of  Confirmation.  That  the 
daughter,  for  instance,  should  transfer  her  alleg- 
iance  fi'oiu   one   Family  to  anotlicr,  requires  ap- 


THE  FAMILY.  75 

proval  of  the  parents,  who  have  reared  her  as 
their  own.  Disregard  of  tlie  one  rehition  means 
logically  the  disregard  of  the  other.  The  parent 
in  Othello  declares:  "As  she  (the  daughter) 
has  deceived  me,  so  she  will  thee" — which 
may  be  considered  one  motive  of  Othello's  later 
jealousy. 

Still  here  it  is  possible  for  the  parent  to  ignore 
or  destroy  the  Right  of  Love,  which  has  asserted 
itself  subjectively  as  the  paramount  element  of 
the  Family.  In  these  conflicts  between  the 
choice  of  the  daughter  and  the  command  of  the 
parent  lies  the  chief  stress  of  most  of  Shake- 
speare's comedies.  This  poet  universally  favors 
the  right  of  the  daughter,  and  therein  is  in  har- 
mony  with  the  spirit  of  the  modern  world. 

In  general,  however,  it  must  be  affirmed  that 
the  two  Families  of  the  betrothed  should  confirm 
the  subjective  will  of  the  pair,  and  thus  help  make 
it  into  a  reality,  not  only  through  consent,  but  also 
through  cession  of  property,  marriage  portions, 
gifts,  etc. 

(2.)  Not  only  the  Family  is  to  confirm  Mar- 
riage, but  the  State  especially  is  to  be  its  guard- 
ian. The  grand  function  of  the  State  is  to  secure 
Free- Will  through  the  Law,  so  that  it  must 
secure  even  the  subjective  promise,  which  is  a 
form  of  obligation.  Still  further,  the  State  en- 
forces marriage-contracts,  tmd  it  defines  and 
vindicates  certain  rights  which  spring  from  the 


76  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

married  relation.  Chiefly  the  State  is  to  safe- 
guard the  institutional  element,  which  begins  in 
the  emotions.  For  the  State  is  just  that  Insti- 
tution which  is  to  secure  Insitutions,  and  hence 
it  takes  all  stages  of  the  rising  Family  under  its 
protection.  To  be  sure  there  is  a  subjective  side 
which  the  State  cannot  reach ;  it  cannot  make 
whole  the  broken  heart,  even  if  it  punish  the 
transgressor. 

(3.)  The  civil  ceremony  of  Marriage  is  the 
outward  confirmation  (through  word  or  sign)  of 
the  State's  participation.  It  may  be  deemed  a 
kind  of  contract  by  which  one  party,  the  married 
pair,  acknowledges  the  civil  Institution,  and  the 
latter  pledges  its  power  to  the  domestic  Institu- 
tion. Even  a  marriage  license  recognizes  the 
authority  of  the  State. 

Such  is,  in  brief,  the  external  or  secular  Con- 
firmation of  Marriage.  Its  purpose  is  to  make 
valid  the  inner  union  b}''  institutional  sanctions, 
and  to  receive  the  new  Family  into  the  institu- 
tional world.  Each  side  is  to  be  impressed  with 
the  fact  that  it  has  both  duties  and  rights. 

Still  there  can  be  Marriage  without  this  exter- 
nal Confirmation.  The  two  lovers  can  form  a 
lasting  union  without  the  consent  of  their 
Families,  and  Avithout  the  acknowledgment  of 
the  State.  That  is,  the  inner  principle  can,  if 
necessary,  dispense  Avith  the  outer  sanction. 
But  then  it  must  have  a  new   sanction,  the  jsanc- 


THE  FAMILY.  77 

tiou  of  its  eternal  nature  b}  tlie  EternaJ.  In 
other  words  Marriage  must  have  a  rehgious  Con- 
firraation,  through  which  it  is  sanctioned  and 
contirmed  by  the  divine  Institution. 

3.  The  Divine  Confirmation.  This  has  both 
an  external  and  internal  side.  There  is  a  return 
to  the  subjective  element  or  emotion ;  each  party 
to  the  Marriage  must  feel  that  a  Self  beyond  the 
individual  Self  confirms  the  union,  and  in  fact 
participates  in  the  same,  imparting  to  it  a  divine 
character ;  the  two  persons  become  one  Person 
through  the  absolute  Person,  and  in  so  far  as 
they  share  in  the  divine  nature.  The  first  con- 
secration of  Love,  calling  for  the  sacrifice  of  the 
Self  to  a  higher  Self,  is  truly  a  religious  mani- 
festation. 

But  this  first  consecration,  which  is  subjective, 
demands  an  objective  consecration,  which  must 
be  institutional.  There  is  a  special  Institution 
which  is  the  divine  Will  actualized,  the  eternal 
Will  which  wills  the  Eternal.  The  Church, 
therefore,  is  invoked  in  Christian  countries  to 
put  its  seal  of  divine  Confirmation  upon  Marriage 
through  its  ceremonies.  Thus  the  married  pair 
recognize  the  eternal  principle  in  their  union 
and  vow  to  it  their  allegiance  as  to  their 
Creator. 

(1)  The  divine  Confirmation  has  its  starting- 
point  in  Love,  through  which  the  individual  first 
experiences  a  sense  of  consecration  to  a  higher 


78  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

power  Avhic'li  is  Love,  Love  universal.  It  is 
through  Love,  as  distinct  from  passion  or 
caprice,  that  the  individual  begins  to  feel  the 
presence  of  the  absolute  Person,  who  is  thus  the 
third  Person  in  whom  and  by  whom  the  two 
married  Persons  are  united.  How  can  two  souls 
be  made  one?  Only  through  the  one  universal 
Soul  creative  of  all,  and  giving  a  new  birth 
throuoh  Love.  For  Love  regenerates  the  hard 
individuality  and  compels  it  to  live  in  and 
through  another. 

Thus  in  Marriage  the  man  and  woman  are 
brought  into  participation  with  the  eternal 
Person,  which  is  the  underlying  sanction  of  their 
union.  This  absolute  "Will  which  is  God,  safe- 
guards all  AVill  willing  Free  Will  and  makes  it  of 
its  own  Self,  which  is  eternal.  For  God  is  not 
Free  Will  willing  Free  Will  capriciously  and 
temporarily,  but  eternally ;  the  eternal  Will  must 
will  the  Eternal  forevermore.  Such  is  the  God 
within,  and  his  primal  di\4ne  Confirmation  of 
Marriage  in  the  human  heart. 

(2)  Marriage  should  also  have  the  Confirma- 
tion of  the  God  Avithout  as  well  as  of  the  God 
within,  that  is,  of  the  Divine  Person  actualized 
in  his  Institution.  Thus  it  comes  that  most 
peoples  have  the  marriage  ceremony  performed 
by  a  man  of  priestly  character  whose  function  is 
to  mediate  the  two  sides,  human  and  divine,  and 
to  bring  the  married  pair  into  a  participation  Avith 


THE  FAMILY.  79 

God.  Through  the  religious  ceremony  that 
Avhioh  was  implicit  is  made  explicit,  that  which 
was  subjective  is  made  objective  and  institutional. 
The  Catholic  Church  regards  Marriage  as  a 
sacrament,  a  sacred  vow  to  the  eternal  Person, 
which  vow  is  thereby  eternal  and  from  which 
there  is  no  release  as  long  as  life  endures. 

(3)  The  inner  life  of  the  married  pair  is  thus 
an  everlasting  union  in  and  with  God,  the  ever- 
lasting Person,  through  Love.  The  inner  and 
the  outer  divine  Confirmation  exists  together,  one 
through  the  other ;  on  the  day  of  the  Marriage 
man  enters  a  new  institutional  existence,  having 
founded  a  new  Famil}''  and  received  the  divine 
Confirmation  of  his  intention.  And  even  though 
there  be  no  religious  ceremony,  the  religious  or 
eternal  element  must  be  in  the  hearts  of  the 
parties,  and  they  must  perform  internally  the  act 
of  consecration  to  the  Institution. 

Thus  Marriage  has  completed  itself,  having 
had  its  three  Confirmations,  which  we  have  named 
the  inner  (or  emotional),  the  external  (or  secu- 
lar), and  the  divine  (or  religious).  It  is  now 
an  Institution  set  forth  into  the  world  and 
confirmed  b}'^  Institutions.  Starting  with  sub- 
jective Love  in  the  human  Person,  it  has 
risen  to  a  participation  in  the  objective  or 
universal  Love  of  the  absolute  Person.  Such 
is  the  first  stage  of  the  Family,  the  process  of  its 
formation,  which  has  rounded  itself  to  comple- 


80  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tioii  when  the  sacred  rite  has  been  performed, 
ending  in  the  vow  of  eternal  fealt}'^  to  the  domes- 
tic Institution  in  the  presence  of  the  Eternal. 

Forth  the  married  pair  go  into  the  external  world, 
in  which,  however,  they  have  their  own  inner 
united  life,  which  is  that  of  the  Family.  Step- 
ping outside  of  the  Church,  the  new  Family 
enters  its  own  environment,  its  own  House,  which 
is  to  become  its  Home.  This  is  the  material  and 
spiritual  structure  which  the  Family  builds  about 
itself  as  its  abiding-place  and  sanctuary,  both  for 
its  own  self-expression  and  for  protection. 

II.  The  Home.  The  pair,  having  formed  a 
new  Family  through  Marriage,  separate  them- 
selves from  their  previous  Families  respectively, 
and  establish  their  own  household,  in  which 
they  are  no  longer  children  but  husband  and 
wife.  Such  is  the  one  separation;  on  the  other 
hand  they  are  separated  from  the  outside  world 
by  their  Home  whose  walls  keep  them  to  them- 
selves in  their  united  life. 

A  great  advance  in  freedom  —  the  ultimate 
end  of  all  Institutions  —  is  such  a  step.  The 
couple,  now  have  their  own  Family,  they  are  in 
possession  of  their  own  domestic  environment, 
which  was  not  the  case  under  the  parental  roof. 
Moreover,  they,  as  truly  institutional  persons, 
reproduce  their  own  Free  Will  in  another  new- 
born Will,  and  thereby  attain  the  supreme  end 
of   the    Family.     Undoubtedly    all   this    brings 


TEE  FAMILY.  81 

with  it  the  subordination  of  the  individual  to  the 
Institution;  in  that  sense  he  has  less  freedom 
after  marriage  than  before.  Freedom  of  caprice 
is  one  thing,  freedom  through  Law  and  Institu- 
tions is  another;  indeed  these  two  sorts  of  free- 
dom are  almost,  though  not  quite,  mutually 
exclusive. 

In  the  new  Family  the  married  pair  are  recon- 
structing their  own  existence,  they  are  re-creat- 
ing what  created  them,  they  are  making  their 
pre-supposition.  As  children  they  were  more  or 
less  the  passive  products  of  the  Family,  but  now 
they  are  its  active  producers ;  that  is,  the  Family 
was  given  to  them  from  the  outside,  but  now 
they  return  and  reproduce  what  was  given.  From 
the  Determined  they  pass  to  the  Self-determined, 
in  the  domestic  sphere. 

The  Home  also  has  its  inclosure  shuttins;  out 
the  world,  though  it  be  in  the  world.  Inside  the 
Home  we  behold  the  orio;inal  matriarchate  or  the 
woman  as  ruler.  She  is  by  nature  the  Home- 
maker  ;  the  man  returns  to  his  Home,  after  the 
conflicts  of  the  day,  as  to  the  realm  of  peace. 

The  Home  (Domus)  has  as  its  supreme  char- 
acteristic domestication.  It  makes  everything 
and  everybody  within  its  reach  domestic  —  man, 
woman,  animals,  even  the  soil.  The  process  of 
the  Home  will  show  this  power  of  domestication, 
which  will  next  be  considered  in  its  di:fferent 
phases. 

6 


82  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

1.  The  woman  domesticated.  The  immediate 
process  of  the  Home  is  hers,  is  her  own  inner 
life;  she  is  the  possibility  of  all  domestication. 
Her  soul,  her  very  touch  has  this  domestic  power. 
The  necessaries  of  life  pass  through  her  hand : 
food,  raiment,  shelter  she  must  domesticate, 
otherwise  they  are  wanting  in  a  certain  element  of 
nutrition ;  at  the  truly  domestic  table  something 
more  than  the  physical  body  is  fed.  Of  course 
people  can  eat  at  a  restaurant  and  live,  often  they 
have  to  do  so;  but,  however  excellent  the  dishes, 
they  soon  grow  wearisome.  Even  in  the  act  of 
eating  his  dinner  man  lives  not  by  bread  alone. 
There  should  be  an  institutional  nourishment 
alonof  with  that  of  the  bodv. 

The  woman  as  Home-maker  is,  then,  to  make 
domestic  the  very  necessaries  of  life;  but  she  is 
also  domesticated  by  them  in  turn.  The  Home 
is  implicitly  in  her  spirit,  still  it  is  to  be  brought 
out  by  training  and  practice.  The  woman  who 
has  a  Home  and  keeps  it  is  never  going  to  get  rid 
of  this  domestic  process.  The  garment  passes 
through  her  hands,  she  is  the  purveyor  of  food, 
and  she  has  if  not  to  make  at  least  to  transform 
the  shelter  of  the  Family.  Still  there  are  various 
gradations  of  this  process  of  domestication,  which 
may  be  classified  in  a  brief  survey. 

( 1 )  In  the  early  stages  of  social  development 
the  wife  does  the  whole  work  of  providing  and 
caring  for   the  Family,  or  nearly  so.     She  per- 


THE  FAMILY.  83 

forms  outdoor  labor,  she  has  to  wrest  from 
Nature,  by  digging  roots,  by  gathering  wild 
berries,  or  by  cultivating  the  fields,  the  things 
needful  for  life,  while  the  man  is  the  warrior  or 
hunter  or  perchance  councillor.  The  Indian 
squaw  chops  the  wood,  and  insists  upon  it  as  her 
right;  she  has  been  seen  to  take  the  axe  re- 
proachfully from  the  hands  of  her  boy  who 
wished  by  work  to  imitate  the  white  man,  and  to 
remand  him  to  his  place  as  a  good  Indian. 
Women  still  toil  in  the  fields  among  civilized 
peoples,  but  it  is  felt  that  she  belongs  in  the 
house,  which  she  is  to  transform  more  and  more 
into  the  Home  by  her  presence  and  by  her  inner 
life.  Advancing  civilization  goes  hand  in  hand 
with  advancing  domestication,  and  the  latter  may 
well  be  deemed,  partially  at  least,  the  cause  of 
the  former. 

Woman's  domestic  labor  now  divides;  at  first 
she  both  provides  from  the  outside  the  necessaries 
of  the  Family  and  transforms  them  in  the  Home. 
Time,  however,  releases  her  from  the  former  and 
confines  her  to  the  latter  task. 

(2)  The  wife,  accordingly,  devotes  herself 
more  exclusively  to  Home-making;  she  trans- 
forms what  the  husband  procures  from  the  out- 
side and  brings  to  her;  she  cooks  the  food, 
produces  the  clothing  by  spinning,  weaving  and 
sewing,  and  she  domesticates  the  rude  bare 
house,  making  it  over  into  a  Home.     She  first 


84  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

produced  in  her  indoor  life  what  are  still  known 
a3  domestic  fabrics,  and  in  the  Home  the  first 
foundation  was  laid  for  domestic  industry,  which 
sprang  from  woman's  love  of  her  Home.  This 
love  led  her  to  improve  it  through  many  little 
appliances,  to  beautify  it,  to  make  it  reflect  her 
own  indwelling  spirit. 

But  the  task  became  at  last  too  great  for  her, 
taking  all  her  time  and  energy,  as  she  had  to 
work  by  hand  (manufacture,  hand-work).  "When 
she  was  turning  into  a  machine,  the  man  came 
to  her  aid  and  his  own  with  an  actual  machine 
(sewing-machine,  spinning-machine,  etc.).  Do- 
mestic manufacture  now  means,  in  spite  of  ety- 
mology, not  hand-made  at  home,  but  rather 
machine-made  at  the  factory.  No  small  part  of  the 
present  industrial  world  grew  out  of  the  Home. 

But  time  (or  the  man)  has  again  brought  relief 
to  the  woman  by  means  of  machinery.  Where- 
with she  in  her  Home  enters  a  new  stage. 

(3)  The  woman  not  only  transforms,  but  she 
transfigures  her  environment — house,  food,  rai- 
ment, shelter,  and  all  domestic  appliances — with 
her  spirit.  She  no  longer  works  so  much  with 
her  own  hands  inside  her  domestic  temple,  yet 
she  puts  her  soul  into  all.  She  no  longer  cooks 
or  sews  much,  though  she  knows  how;  still  her 
look,  her  touch  is  upon  everything.  In  a  high 
degree  she  has  become  a  spirit,  indwelling  and 
directing   the   Home.     To   be   sure  some  relief 


THE  FAMILY.  86 

from  the  enslaving  tasks  of  the  hand  is  necessary 
for  this  stage ;  there  must  also  be  time  for  men- 
tal culture  and  for  travel ;  such  a  woman  ought 
to  see  the  Homes  of  the  world. 

At  this  point  the  Home  becomes  artistic,  re- 
flecting purely  and  transparently  the  spirit  of  an 
Institution,  here  the  family,  with  its  personal 
embodiment  at  the  center.  The  dwelling-place 
of  the  Family,  the  House  is  now  to  rise  into 
being  a  work  of  Art,  and  reveal  the  soul  inside 
by  the  architectural  forms  outside.  The  flower- 
incr  of  Domestic  Architecture  seems  to  belong  to 
the  Renascence,  and  not  to  antiquity  or  to  the 
medieval  period. 

When  the  woman  can  not  only  transform  but 
transfigure  her  Home,  it  may  be  said  of  her 
that  she  is  completely  domesticated.  Through  a 
long;  and  severe  training  she  has  risen  from  her 
double  task,  outdoors  and  indoors,  in  which  her 
domestic  spirit  was  certainly  present  and  active, 
but  weighed  down  and  smothered  under  her 
physical  burdens,  to  being  the  spirit  incarnate 
and  creative  of  the  Home.  No  doubt  this  last 
stage  has  not  yet  been  attained  by  the  great 
majority  of  Homes ;  still  it  has  been  attained  by 
some,  and  is  to  be  made  attainable  for  all,  at 
least  for  all  that  persistently  strive  for  its  attain- 
ment. Let  it  be  said  here  that  wealth  does  not 
give  it  though  helpful,  that  poverty  does  not 
hinder  it  though  an  impediment. 


86  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Close  to  the  woman,  as  she  goes  through 
this  process  of  the  Home,  we  have"  seen  the 
man  hovering  around,  as  it  were,  and  then 
helping.  At  first  he  watched  over  her  some- 
what in  the  distance,  as  defender  of  the  com- 
munity ;  then  he  drew  near  and  relieved  her 
of  her  outdoor  burden,  which  he  took  upon 
himself ;  finally  he  gave  her  a  prodigious  lift  in 
her  indoor  task,  relieving  her  of  her  grinding 
mechanical  routine  chiefly  by  a  machine.  Along 
with  her  he  too  is  being  domesticated  —  at  which 
process  we  may  next  take  a  glance. 

2.  The  man  domesticated.  He  is  properly  the 
provider  of  the  Home,  as  it  is  at  present  con- 
stituted. He  goes  outside  of  it  and  there  has 
his  struo-orle  for  its  existence :  the  enemv  of 
the  nation  or  the  forces  of  nature  he  must 
grapple  with,  and  not  let  them  destroy  his  Home. 
In  protecting  the  Family  he  is  protecting  the 
creative  source  of  his  people,  yea  of  his  race. 
He  must  will  not  only  the  existence  but  the 
reproduction  of  Free-Will,  and  oifer  himself, 
if  necessary,  as  a  sacrifice  for  such  an  end. 

Hence  the  man  separates  from  Home,  from 
wife  and  child,  in  order  that  he  may  secure 
that  Home  and  wife  and  child.  He,  too,  is 
plainly  in  training,  is  in  the  process  of  domesti- 
cation. 

(1)  Man's  first  domestication  is  his  Marriage, 
bis  submission  to  the  Institution,  which  is  of 


THE  FAMILY.  87 

course  his  own  act.  But  then  the  wife  domesti- 
cates him  too,  transforms  in  the  Home  quite 
everything  which  he  needs.  In  one  way  or 
other  he  receives  from  her  hands  his  food,  his 
clothing,  his  shelter.  He  may  have  furnished 
her  the  original  crude  material,  and  usually  does 
furnish  it,  but  she  domesticates  it  and  through  it 
domesticates  him.  So  the  Home  is  her  field  of 
influence,  the  place  where  her  spirit  rules,  the 
trne  gi/nocraci/ ;  the  man  in  the  Home  drinks  of 
her  Institution,  and  participates  in  her  soul, 
going  back  daily  to  the  fountain-head  of  the 
institutional  world,  the  Home. 

(2)  But  in  the  Home  the  man  is  not  to  stay, 
his  call  is  to  go  forth  into  the  world,  with  which 
he  has  the  conflict  of  existence  for  himself  and 
for  his  own.  Hence  he  is  the  head  of  the  Family 
in  all  external  relations,  he  is  its  representative 
before  the  law  which  is  to  determine  these  ex- 
ternal relations.  On  this  side  the  spirit  of  the 
man  rules,  and  there  is  here  an  androcracy 
which  has  its  field  more  outside  the  Home  than 
inside.  In  the  lower  sphere  man  has  to  furnish 
the  strength,  in  the  higher  the  justice  of  the 
world.  In  primitive  society  he  procures,  as 
hunter  or  herdsman,  the  raw  material  of  life;, 
later  he  furnishes  from  the  outside  what  the 
woman  transforms  inside  the  Home ;  finally  when 
her  domestic  burden  is  too  great,  he  relieves  her 
b^  the  machine, 


88  SOCIAL  mSTITUTIONS. 

This  last  factor  is  to  be  carefully  noticed.  It 
is  the  man  who  comes  to  woman's  aid  with  his 
inventive  power  even  in  her  own  sphere.  Though 
the  woman  is  the  one  who  sews,  she  did  not 
invent  the  sewing-machine;  though  she  is  the 
original  spinner,  she  did  not  invent  the  spinning- 
machine,  nor  did  she,  the  chief  weaver,  invent 
the  power-loom.  These  inventions  have  been  the 
greatest  liberators  of  woman,  enabling  her  to  rise 
in  her  own  Home  from  doing  the  work  of  the 
hand  to  doing  work  of  the  spirit,  from  being  a 
mere  domestic  artisan  to  being  a  domestic  artist. 
And  these  inventions  have  been  the  work  of  men, 
the  end  of  which  has  been  the  higher  freedom  of 
woman  in  her  own  Home.  The  genius  of  the 
woman,  as  revealed  in  the  past,  is  not  inventive; 
hers  is  a  different  sphere. 

(3)  The  man  returns  to  his  Home  after  his 
struggles  with  the  world,  thus  obtaining  the  bene- 
fit and  the  blessing  of  what  he  has  done  outside. 
A  nobler  domestication  awaits  him  there,  for  he 
shares  in  every  advance  of  the  Home.  He  has 
to  be  domesticated  every  day,  coming  back  from 
the  battle  of  life  to  the  peace  of  the  Family.  To 
be  sure  he  sometimes  finds  there  a  new  war, 
greater  than  that  outside,  and  he  may  have  to 
flee  in  the  other  direction  for  his  peace.  But 
these  negative  elements  in  the  Family  will  come 
up  later  for  consideration;  at  present  we  are 
looking  at  the  positive  Family. 


THE  FAMILY.  89 

Such,  then,  is  in  general  the  process  of  man's 
domestication,  through  which  he  has  to  pass  in 
his  Home,  that  he  quaff  of  the  primal  institu- 
tional spirit  of  his  race.  He  must  perform  daily 
this  service,  this  act  of  self-surrender  to  the  In- 
stitution, otherwise  he  is  in  danger  of  becoming 
barbarized,  a  selfish,  combative  unit  in  competi- 
tion with  other  like  units  in  a  social  Pandemo- 
nium. 

Thus  the  man  has  been  tamed  from  his  wild, 
natural  condition,  and  transmuted  into  an  institu- 
tional being  by  the  Home  —  all  of  which  we  have 
called  his  domestication.  And  the  woman  too 
we  have  seen  passing  through  the  same  process 
in  her  way.  The  natural  man  and  woman  (or 
human  nature),  have  been  subdued,  transformed, 
and  filled  with  a  new  end.  Now  the  fact  arises 
that  external  Nature  likewise  is  to  be  domesti- 
cated ;  not  onl}'  human  Nature  but  also  extra- 
human  Nature  —  animal,  plant,  even  the  inorganic 
elements  —  must  be  made  domestic,  made  to  par- 
ticipate in  this  spirit  of  the  Home.  It  would 
seem  that  all  Nature,  the  cosmos  itself,  is  at  last 
to  be  domesticated,  and  the  Universe  to  become 
the 'Home  of  Man. 

3.  Nature  domesticated.  We  conceive  the 
house,  the  abode  of  the  Family,  as  the  center  of 
domestication,  from  which  rays  out  an  influence 
over  surrounding  Nature.  The  Home  of  the 
agriculturist  we  may  first  consider  it,  subjecting 


90  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  wild  world  about  him  to  the  great  end  of  the 
Family,  which  world  is  thereby  domesticated.  A 
new  spirit  or  character  enters  into  the  object  of 
Nature,  be  it  animal  or  plant,  and  makes  it  over ; 
this  spirit  issues  from  the  Home  and  adds  a  new 
title  and  a  new  trait  to  the  natural  animal  or 
plant,  making  it  domestic  along  with  the  man 
and  the  woman. 

What  is  the  source  of  this  added  element?  As 
already  stated,  the  end  of  the  Family  is  the  re- 
production of  the  human  individual  as  an  insti- 
tutional being  through  the  Institution.  As  the 
Family  transforms  man,  so  it  transforms  the 
lower  orders  of  Nature,  whose  reproduction  is  not 
now  left  to  run  wild  in  mere  gratification,  but  is 
controlled  by  and  filled  with  the  new  end,  the 
Institution.  Thus  all  Nature  is  to  be  first  domes- 
ticated, then  socialized,  and  even  civilized  ;  it  is 
to  be  made  to  share  in  Family,  Society,  State. 
Let  us  note  briefly  the  stages  of  Nature  domesti- 
cated. 

(1)  Beginning  with  the  animal  kingdom  we 
observe  that  the  Home  has  domesticated  two 
animals  as  its  special  guardians,  the  dog,  and  in 
a  less  degree,  the  cat.  Then  it  has  tamed  and 
improved  another  class  of  animals  for  their  food- 
producing  qualities — the  cow,  sheep,  pig,  goat. 
Still  another  class  it  has  domesticated  for  work,  as 
the  horse.  Then,  too,  a  great  variety  of  fowls  — 
turkey,  duck,  goose,  pigeons,  cbickens.     Here 


THE  FAMILY.  91 

we  may  place  an  insect,  the  honey-bee;  also  a 
fish  possibly,  the  gold-fish.   '    ht    t^i--^^''' 

All  these  specimens  of  animated  nature  were 
once  wild,  or  have  been  derived  from  wild  ances- 
tors. But  man,  or  rather  the  Family,  has  taken 
them  and  imparted  to  them  of  its  domestic  spirit. 
This  is  the  transforming  power  to  which  all 
Nature  seems  plastic.  The  Home  may  be  con- 
sidered Nature's  first  artist,  filling  her  forms  with 
a  new  spirit  which  is  institutional.  Language 
has  registered  this  fact  in  the  word  doiuestlc  as 
applied  to  an  animal.  Take  the  dog  which  has 
been  variously  supposed  to  be  derived  from  the 
wolf,  fox,  jackal,  or  a  species  of  wild  dog;  at 
any  rate,  how  different  the  domestic  breed  from 
the  wild  !  And  how  many  different  forms,  sizes, 
characters  in  the  domestic  breed !  Truly  a  for- 
mable  material  did  the  original  canine  stock 
furnish  to  the  hands  of  man,  similar  to  the  block 
of  marble  in  the  hands  of  the  sculptor. 

How  is  this  done?  Chiefly  the  human  Family 
takes  to  itself  the  animal  Family,  and  provides 
for  it  against  the  accidents  and  strokes  of  savage 
Nature,  securing  to  it  often  food  and  shelter,  and 
sometimes  clothing.  The  Home  does  for  the 
animal  what  it  does  for  itself,  and  thus  gives  to 
the  dumb  creature  a  Home,  thereby  making  it 
domestic.  We  see,  therefore,  that  domestica- 
tion is  deeply  connected  with  reproduction;  the 
l>nit(',  reproducing  itself  in  most  formnble  jiust 


92  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

at  the  period  of  formation,  and  the  Family 
transforms  it  with  its  own  spirit  and  fills  it  with 
its  own  end. 

The  animal  becomes  more  fertile  by  domesti- 
cation, which  looks  after  this  productive  power. 
Darwin  says  that  domestication  often  cures  ster- 
ilitj^  and  the  pivotal  fact  of  his  doctrine  of 
Natural  Selection  is  the  reproduction  of  the  in- 
dividual as  moulded  by  nature  and  man .  Nature 
gives  an  enormous  increase,  but  destroys  enor- 
mously through  the  struggle  for  existence.  Man 
stops  this  destruction,  through  his  protection  of 
the  reproductive  power  of  animals  and  his  care 
for  the  offspring.  He  builds  a  Home  for  his 
animals,  in  a  degree  patterned  after  and  certainly 
derived  from  his  own  Home,  and  treats  them 
with  a  domestic  affection  sprung  of  his  own  life. 
And  the  influence  is  retro-active.  A  neglected 
horse  is  apt  to  mean  a  careless  husband  or  father ; 
the  animal  Home  reflects  the  master's  own  Home ; 
look  into  a  farmer "s  pig-pen,  and  in  most  cases 
you  can  tell  something  about  his  house  inside. 
Among  the  peasantry  of  Europe  the  stable  and 
the  cow-stall  are  often  under  the  same  roof  with 
the  human  household;  both  Families,  that  of  the 
animal  and  of  man,  occupy  different  apartments 
of  the  same  Home. 

Under  the  rule  of  the  Home  there  is  a  recog- 
nized law  observed  by  the  animal  members ;  the 
cat   and  the  dog,  hereditary  foes  to  each  other, 


THE  FAMILY.  58 

learn  to  keep  the  peace  of  the  household  and 
endure  each  other's  presence,  indeed  they  have 
been  known  to  help  each  other.  Both  control 
their  predatory  instinct  against  other  domesti- 
cated animals,  though  they  let  it  loose  against 
wild  prey.  Thus  the  lower  animal  is  brought  to 
recognize  the  Law  and  the  Institution  through  the 
Home,  and  it  too  in  its  wa}^  becomes  institutional. 

(2.)  In  like  manner  quite  a  fragment  of  the  veg- 
etable world  has  been  domesticated.  The  grains 
(wheat,  rye,  barley,  maize,  etc.)  are  derived  from 
wild  ancestors;  so,  too,  the  fruits  and  the  culi- 
nary plants  (peas,  potatoes,  cabbages,  etc.). 

Here  again  it  is  the  Family  usually  which  fur- 
nishes food,  shelter  and  protection  in  various 
ways,  guarding  the  plant  against  its  enemies,  and 
enabling  it  to  reproduce  itself  prodigiously.  Thus 
the  human  Home  secures  its  sustenance  by  look- 
ing after  the  vegetable  Home  —  the  garden,  the 
farm.  Man  lives  from  the  reproductive  power  of 
the  animal  and  plant ;  his  own  body  is  reproduced 
daily  from  food,  w^hich  is  itself  a  product  of  re- 
productive energy.  Seeds,  grains,  nuts  are  the 
concentrated  germs  of  vegetable  reproduction, 
through  which  man  reproduces  daily  his  body. 

The  Home  takes  delight  in  flowers  and  culti- 
vates them  for  their  own  sake,  as  they  reflect  it 
and  suggest  it  in  its  inner  essence.  The  flower 
is  the  outer  manifestation  of  the  plant's  own  re- 
production, and,  having  no  immediately  useful 


94  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

end,  becomes  a  symbol  of  the  Family,  beautiful 
in  the  Home  because  suggesting  the  ideal  purpose 
of  the  Home,  which  is  also  a  flowering  of  the 
individual.  In  fact  the  vegetable  process  has  a 
very  close  analogy  to  the  domestic  process,  each 
passing  through  its  own  cycle. 

(3)  Inorganic  Nature  also  is  domesticated,  is 
transformed  and  filled  with  the  end  of  the  Home. 
When  the  agriculturist  puts  his  plow  into  the 
soil,  he  is  subjecting  it  to  a  new  purpose ;  he  is 
seeking  to  make  it  productive,  to  make  it  the 
Home  of  his  plants  and  animals,  of  himself  and 
his  Family.  The  earth's  generative  power  he 
must  seize,  employ,  transform ;  he  cannot  per- 
mit it  to  run  wild  in  native  luxuriance.  Thus  the 
Family  trains  the  reproductive  capacity  of  the 
soil  for  its  own  reproduction.  Note  that  the  soil 
too  needs  food  in  the  shape  of  manure  and  ferti- 
lizers, for  it  can  be  exhausted,  and  it  may  also 
require  protection  against  flood  and  storm.  Then 
it  may  need  special  assistance  to  change  it  from 
a  sterile  into  a  fertile  condition,  which  happens 
in  the  case  of  irrigation. 

Cultivation  is  primarily  domestication.  Wild 
man  and  wild  nature  obtain  their  early  culture 
through  the  Home,  which,  though  rude,  is  civil- 
izing. The  Family  is  the  primordial  fountain  of 
the  institutional  spirit,  which,  as  we  have  just 
seen,  reaches  down  from  man  to  the  animal  and 
plant,  to  the  very  earth  upon  which  he  treads. 


THE  FAMILY.  95 

Not  without  significance  has  "a  free  soil" 
been  conjoined  with  the  ideal  end  of  freedom, 
and  given  its  name  to  a  political  creed.  The 
ground  upon  which  the  human  being  builds  his 
Home  is  to  be  made  institutional,  and  thus  en- 
dowed with  his  supreme  end,  freedom. 

Man  educates  his  animals  and  his  grains  as  he 
does  his  own  child,  and  they  are  capable  of  receiv- 
ing his  education  and  in  a  way  acquiring  his  spirit. 
The  plasticity  of  all  Nature  to  domestic  training 
is  the  prime  fact  of  civilization.  The  farmer 
can  protect  his  crop  often  against  the  coming 
storm  or  frost ;  it  is  getting  to  be  one  duty  of  the 
State  to  forecast  for  him  the  weather.  The  me- 
teorological process  of  the  earth,  or  a  large  part 
of  it,  is  becoming  the  daily  knowledge  of  every 
person  who  may  be  affected  by  that  process,  and 
who  may,  therefore,  protect  not  only  his  domes- 
tic but  his  domesticated  circle  from  the  fury  of 
the  elements. 

The  Home  has  now  completed  its  sweep  of 
power,  having  domesticated  both  human  and 
extra-human  Nature.  It  has  made  the  world  over 
mto  the  dwelling-place  of  the  Institution,  creat- 
ing an  outer  visible  manifestation  of  the  Family. 
Next  we  shall  look  inside  the  Home,  and  behold 
its  ideal  end  realizing  itself,  actually  embodied  in 
a  fresh  incarnation  of  the  Person. 

III.  The  Child.  The  two  become  three,  and 
thus  we  behold  the  domestic  trinity,  which  is,  how- 


96  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ever,  a  deeper  unity.  For  this  unity  is  no  longer 
merely  subjective  and  emotional,  but  is  an  exist- 
ent visible  object,  which  mediates  the  married 
twain  in  reality.  The  love  of  husband  and  wife 
becomes  incorporate  in  the  Child,  self -creative 
and  creative  of  the  Self.  That  which  was  im- 
plicit in  Marriage,  has  now  become  explicit;  the 
inner  meaning  of  love  is  uttered  and  published 
to  the  world  in  this  third  person  of  the  domestic 
trinity. 

Already  we  have  found  that  the  Family,  being 
actuahzed  Free-Will,  has  as  its  end  the  repro- 
duction of  the  human  individual  as  a  new  Free- 
Will  in  the  world.  The  individual  first  appears 
as  the  Child,  who  is  to  be  born  in  the  Family, 
and  is  to  receive  from  it  his  early  training.  In 
the  Child  the  parents  return,  as  it  were,  into 
themselves,  into  their  very  beginning,  and  re- 
enact  their  own  cycle  of  existence.  They  repro- 
duce themselves  as  sexual  and  as  unmarried 
through  marriage,  and  they  are  to  carry  their 
child  forward  as  they  were  carried  forward  by  the 
Family,  till  perchance  he  gets  married,  as  they  did. 
They  are  to  give  him  not  merely  their  phj^sical 
but  also  their  spiritual  heritage.  The  great  end 
of  the  Family  is  that  an  institutional  Person  be 
reproduced,  not  simply  a  human  animal.  The 
Child  at  birth  is  but  the  possibility  of  Institu- 
tions, which  are  to  be  realized  in  him  through 
education. 


THE  FAMILY.  97 

Thus  we  are  to  see  that  the  essence  of  the 
Child  is  that  he  is  a  return,  yet  a  new  and  orig- 
inal return  of  the  parents  into  themselves,  into 
their  origin,  reproducing  not  only  their  bodies 
but  also  their  souls  laden  with  their  moral,  intel- 
lectual, and  institutional  endowments.  A  still 
deeper  return  lies  in  every  born  Child :  he  is  the 
return  to  the  beginning  of  his  race,  which  he  has 
to  reproduce  ideally  in  his  OAvn  development. 
Very  well-known  has  become  the  educational 
maxim :  the  Child  unfolds  as  the  Kace  has  un- 
folded. Ee-creating  the  life  of  humanity  in  him- 
self, is  he  truly  generic  and  belongs  to  the  genus 
homo,  being  ordered  in  said  genus  by  an  inner 
classification,  not  by  an  outer  one. 

1.  The  Child  in  the  Home.  The  Child  is  born 
in  the  Home,  which  has  the  most  immediate  re- 
lation to  the  new-comer.  He  too  must  be  domes- 
ticated first  of  all;  with  his  earliest  nurture 
begins  his  domestic  training.  Into  the  Home  he 
comes  an  animal,  naked  of  body  and  naked  of 
Institutions,  which  double  nakedness  the  Home 
must  first  clothe. 

( 1 )  The  parents  have  also  their  discipline  in 
the  Home  with  the  infant.  For  them  the  birth 
of  the  child  is  likewise  a  new  birth,  a  kind  of 
palingenesis.  Love  is  re-created  in  a  fresh 
form ;  in  Marriage  the  love  of  husband  and  wife 
was  simply  internal,  but  now  it  exists  in  an 
external  object,  which  is,  so  to  speak,  both  of 

7 


98  SOCIAL  INSTITUTION'S. 

them.  The  mother  loves  her  child,  and  in  him 
loves  her  husband  with  a  new  love.  The  father 
too  feels  the  like  regeneration  of  his  love  for  the 
mother  of  his  child.  They  are  married  again  by 
the  strongest  confirmation,  really  the  soul  and 
the  purpose  of  the  three  confirmations  before 
mentioned.  Hence  conies  a  new  consecration  of 
both  to  their  common  love,  which  has  brought 
with  it  a  new  tremendous  responsibility. 

(2)  The  child  in  its  turn  unfolds  into  love  for 
the  parents,  thus  the  three  are  united  in  a  deep 
emotional  bond.  As  the  mother  stands  in  a  more 
direct  relation  to  her  offspring  than  the  father, 
there  springs  up  a  peculiar  bond  between  the 
mother  and  her  child,  which  gives  her  the  first 
place  in  his  training.  She  instinctively  seeks  to 
reproduce  in  him  her  own  devotion  and  self- 
sacrifice;  her  mother-love  longs  to  see  itself  re- 
turned through  the  child.  Still  mother-love  just 
by  its  excess,  by  too  much  devotion  to  the  child, 
can  produce  in  him  quite  the  opposite  of  itself, 
namely  selfishness. 

The  father  is  not  to  be  omitted  in  the  training 
of  his  child  in  the  Home.  In  the  man  is  usually 
found  a  more  unbending  element,  that  of  justice, 
which  the  child  has  also  to  learn ;  thus  he  finds 
out  what  he  has  really  done,  being  made  to  taste 
the  nature  of  his  deed.  Obedience  to  law  as 
voiced  by  the  parents  belongs  to  the  training  of 
the  child  especially  in   the  Home.     This  obedi- 


THE  FAMILY.  99 

ence  has  to  puss  through  some  form  of  fear  ere  it    I 
unites  fully  with  love.     The  child  has  to  learn  to 
obey  through   love,  he    does    not  possess    such 
obedience  at  first  hand  or  by  nature. 

(3)  So  we  see  that  Nature  even  in  the  inno- 
cent babe  is  to  be  domesticated ,  or  at  least  is  to 
start  on  its  career  of  domestication.  Already 
we  have  observed  that  this  is  true  both  of  human 
and  extra-human  Nature,  and  the  child  being 
human  cannot  well  be  an  exception.  The  Home 
is  to  make  him  domestic,  to  fill  him  with  the 
Institution  in  its  first  form,  that  of  the  Family. 
So  the  Home  is  to  impart  the  primal  institutional 
spirit  to  the  child,  which  is  the  love  of  mother 
and  father,  and  through  this  love  he  is  to  obey 
their  commandments.  Obedience  through  love 
is  the  first  subjection  of  the  child's  will  to  the 
Institution,  its  first  training  to  an  ethical  life. 
The  parent's  love  of  his  child  must  have  in  it 
law,  and  the  child's  love  of  his  parent  must  have 
in  it  obedience. 

Still  the  parent  should  never  forget  that  the 
very  purpose  of  his  law  is  the  training  of  child 
into  freedom.  Through  parental  authority  the 
child  is  to  learn  what  freedom  is,  that  is,  insti- 
tutional freedom .  Arbitrary  commands,  passion, 
or  caprice  on  the  part  of  the  parent  are  destruc- 
tive of  true  education.  At  this  point  the  parent 
needs  help,  his  child  is  taken  from  him  during  a 
part  of  the  day  or  year  and  put  under  a  new  control. 


100  iSOCIAL  INi^TITUTIONS. 

2.  The  Child  at  school.  Such  is  the  separa- 
tion which  now  appears  in  the  life  of  the  child : 
he  is  removed  from  the  Home  and  sent  to  school, 
whose  ultimate  object  is  to  train  him  to  an  insti- 
tutional life  as  a  whole. 

The  Family  begins  soon  to  show  its  inade- 
quacy for  the  complete  training  of  the  child,  who 
is  to  be  inducted  into  the  institutional  world 
freed  from  its  personal  factor  in  the  Home. 
Obviously  the  Family  can  for  the  most  part  sim- 
ply reproduce  itself  in  the  child,  can  make  him 
domestic.  But  he  must  soon  take  wings  and  fly 
beyond  this  limitation ;  his  destiny  is  to  become 
a  social  being  also,  and  to  absorb  into  himself 
the  entire  world  of  Institutions.  Now  there  is 
an  Institution  which  has  just  this  purpose, 
namely  the  school  or  the  Educative  Institution. 
(See  the  third  part  of  the  present  work  where 
the  Educative  Institution  is  specially  treated.) 

So  the  child  has  to  be  sent  out  of  its  home  to 
school,  in  which  the  parent  with  his  love  is  not 
the  ruler,  but  a  new  kind  of  authority.  He  be- 
gins to  make  the  transition  from  the  law  of  love 
to  the  love  of  the  law.  Obedience  is  not  so 
much  to  the  person  as  to  the  Institution.  The 
school  is  certainly  not  to  banish  love  but  to  fill  it 
with  a  new  content,  which  does  not  displace,  but 
complements  domestic  love.  The  day  on  which 
the  child  starts  to  school,  and  separates  him  from 
the  parental  Home  to  enter  the  educative  Home, 


THE  FAMILY.  101 

is  an  event  like  that  of  birth,  he  finds  himself  in 
a  new  world. 

Of  course  this  separation  should  not  be  too 
sudden  or  rapid.  The  following  stages  of  the 
Educative  Institution  we  may  here  notice,  though 
the  whole  subject  is  to  be  considered  later.  (1) 
The  kindergarden,  which  is  the  happy  transition, 
belongs  to  the  school,  but  fuses  it  with  the  spirit 
of  the  Home,  and  has  the  child  only  a  few  hours 
each  day.  (2)  The  school  proper  takes  a  greater 
amount  of  time  and  effort  from  the  Home.  (3)  ^ 
The  child,  becoming  mature,  usually  leaves  the  ( 

Home  entirely  for  a  while,  and  goes  to  a  distant 
school,  college,  or  university,  each  of  which  has 
its  own  social  life. 

Thus  the  Family  in  educating  the  child  must 
call  in  the  aid  of  the  Educative  Institution,  for  the 
mother  with  her  love  and  the  father  with  his  law 
are  not  equal  to  the  task.  Such  is  the  case  even 
when  the  parents  strive  to  do  their  duty ;  still 
more  is  the  school  with  its  institutional  trainins; 
necessary  when  the  parent  is  neglectful  or 
tyrannical,  and  the  child  is  in  consequence  dis- 
obedient, and  receives  no  domestication  from  the 
Home. 

The  child  in  early  life  passes  daily  from  Home 
lo  school  and  back  again,  thus  sharing  in  both. 
The  school  keeps  increasing  its  demands  till  at 
last  he  separates  entirely  from  Home  and  enters 
a    school- world.     This    separation    from    Home 


102  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

may  of  course  be  brought  about  in  other  ways 
besides  that  of  the  school. 

The  child  sooner  or  later,  returns  home,  but 
he  is  no  lonsrer  a  child.  He  has  vindicated  his 
independence,  and  in  that  light  we  may  look  at 
him  for  a  moment. 

3.  TJie  free  individual.  From  birth  the  child 
has  been  in  training  for  freedom.  The  mother 
even  in  her  play  with  the  child  is  really  making 
him  independent  of  herself.  She  calls  forth  his 
endurance,  his  manliness,  his  selfhood,  in  fine 
every  trait  which  develops  a  self-reliant  char- 
acter. In  the  school  begins  the  actual  separation 
from  Home,  which,  at  first  for  brief  periods,  at 
last  becomes  complete.  Having  received  the 
training  of  the  Home  and  the  School,  he  is  a  free 
man,  and  is  henceforth  to  be  trained  by  himself 
in  his  grapple  with  the  world. 

Though  he  return  to  the  paternal  roof,  he  is  no 
longer  the  child  at  home,  nor  the  child  at  school. 
He  has  graduated  from  both.  He  is  a  free  indi- 
vidual, yet  with  the  new  task  of  freedom. 
Through  education,  domestic  and  scholastic,  he 
possesses  ideally  in  his  soul  the  whole  institutional 
world ;  his  new  task  is  to  make  actual  by  his  deed 
and  to  re-create  in  his  life  this  world  of  Institu- 
tions. He  is  not  to  live  simply  an  individual  ex- 
istence, but  an  universal  one;  though  he  be  a 
free  individual,  he  is  not  actually  free,  his  freedom 
is    actualized  onlv  in  and  throuoh  Institutions. 


THE  FAMILY.  108 

The  first  of  these  Institutions  is  the  Family, 
which  our  free  individual  is  now  to  enter.  But 
this  brings  us  back  to  INIarriage,  which,  we  may 
remember,  was  the  starting-point  of  the  Family. 
Thus  we  have  gone  through  the  domestic  cycle 
whose  end  has  returned  to  its  beo-innino^.  Mar- 
riao;e,  having;  made  the  Home,  ha  vino;  begotten 
the  child  and  educated  him  into  independent 
manhood,  has  reproduced  itself.  Such  is  the 
completed  process  of  the  Positive  Family. 

But  with  this  completion  of  the  Positive  Family 
an  element  of  dissolution  enters  the  Home.  The 
free  individual,  offspringof  theFamih%  separates 
from  it  and  thus  begins  to  break  it  up.  There 
are  all  grades  of  permanence  in  the  Family,  from 
the  American  to  the  Chinese.  In  the  latter, 
even  the  dead  parent  has  his  place. 

Still  further,  the  formation  of  the  new  Family 
has  a  tendency  to  dissolve  the  old,  which  indeed 
has  lost  its  substantial  purpose  when  it  can  no 
longer  rear  the  child.  The  free  individual  must 
actualize  his  freedom,  and  so  must  quit  father 
and  mother,  and  establish  his  own  Family.  The 
acorns  fall  and  leave  the  parent  tree  stript,  each 
is  itself  to  become  a  tree. 

But  the  free  individual  may  use  his  freedom  in 
a  wholly  different  way,  he  may  refuse  to  estab- 
lish his  own  Home,  he  may  hold  himself  aloof 
from  the  Family,  he  may  prefer  to  keep  to  him- 
self  his    free   individualitv.     Thus    he  becomoe 


104  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

negative  to  the  Family  in  asserting  his  personal 
freedom,  which  he  declines  to  makes  institutional 
by  a  domestic  life. 

Thus  at  every  stage  of  the  process  of  the 
Family  there  is  a  destroying  element  which  inter- 
twines itself  in  the  movement,  and  which  lies  in 
the  very  nature  of  Free-Will.  The  result  is  a  fall 
or  descent  of  the  Family  in  the  midst  of  its  very 
bloom,  a  tendency  to  undo  itself  and  go  backward 
to  the  primal  starting-point.  No  treatise  on  the 
Family  is  complete  without  taking  into  account 
this  negative  element  permeating  its  organism  at 
every  joint.  Moreover  we  must  see  the  place  of 
such  a  phenomenon  in  the  movement  of  the 
whole  Institution. 


II.  The  Negative  Family. 

Here  we  must  reckon  with  all  the  adverse 
forces  which  tend  to  dissolve  the  Family.  They 
will  reveal  its  negative  process,  which  is  indeed 
inherent,  as  long  as  man  possesses  that  marvelous 
gift  of  his  called  Free- Will,  and  realizes  it  freely. 
The  recompense  comes  to  him  whether  or  not  he 
will  actualize  that  Free- Will  in  an  Institution.  If 
he  does  not,  then  the  counter-current  of  negation 
sets  in,  and  he  need  not  stop  till  he  reduces  him- 
self back  to  the  merely  natural  individual,  whom 
Kousgeau  and  others  deem  the  truly  free  man. 


THE  FAMILY.  105 

Still  the  Family  may  be  destroyed  from  the 
outside  also,  in  the  simple  process  of  Nature. 
Death  keeps  his  reckoning  with  the  Family,  often 
in  the  most  remorseless  fashion,  sweeping  down 
not  only  the  aged  but  also  the  young.  Partic- 
ularly the  child  is  his  prey,  the  very  object  and 
hope  of  the  Family ;  the  old  tiger  loves  to  lap  the 
blood  of  infants,  of  whom  nearly  one-half  die 
before  the  age  of  five  years.  Such  is  the  element 
of  external  Fate  which  perpetually  overhangs  the 
Family. 

Thus  we  are  compelled  to  look  at  the  Family 
in  a  twofold  aspect,  positive  and  negative,  con- 
structive and  destructive ;  alongside  the  Institu- 
tion as  it  exists  in  its  highest  form  is  a  descend- 
ing current  which  is  carrying  it  back  to  a  state  of 
nature,  to  its  physical  beginning.  Within  the 
monogamous  Family  we  behold  an  incessant  re- 
version to  former  stages. 

These  various  negative  forces  working  upon  and 
in  the  Family  we  shall  seek  to  order  in  a  rapid  survey 
for  the  purpose  of  bringing  out  the  psychical  con- 
nection of  the  phenomena.  The  Family  may  be 
broken  up  from  the  outside,  it  may  be  dissolved 
from  the  inside,  it  may  be  perverted  into  an  Insti- 
tution just  the  opposite  of  itself  and  utterly 
destructive  of  its  end.  These  are  the  three  stages 
of  what  we  call  the  negative  Family  in  a  general 
way,  embracing  all  the  destructive  agencies  which 
are  connected  with  the  Institution. 


106  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

I.  The  Family  Assailed  from  Without.  As 
the  members  of  this  Institution  are  human  and 
mortal,  they  are  subject  to  the  external  forces  of 
Nature.  But  just  through  its  own  natural  growth 
the  Family  is  separated  and  broken  in  twain. 
Still  further  the  individual  may  keep  aloof  from 
the  Family.  In  all  these  cases  the  inner  element 
of  domestic  life,  love,  is  not  involved,  at  least 
not  directly. 

(1)  Death  is  the  most  immediate  of  these  as- 
sailing forces.  It  may  come  at  any  time  to  any 
member ;  still  in  the  due  course  of  nature  the 
affed  are  taken  and  their  Family  comes  to  its  end. 
But  also  in  the  due  course  of  Nature  the  new 
Family  appears. 

(2)  This  produces  a  division  into  two  Fam- 
ilies, the  old  and  the  new,  the  latter  growing  out 
of  the  former  and  taking  away  its  young  life. 
The  domestic  cycle  blooms,  throws  off  its  fruit, 
and  decays  in  a  generation  or  two,  like  the  vege- 
table cycle  which  may  last  only  a  year.  So  this 
very  process  of  life  bears  in  it  the  end  of  life, 
and  the  Family  separates  into  two  Families,  the 
ascending  and  the  declining. 

(3)  But  the  main  negative  force  undoing  the 
Family  lies  in  the  free  individual,  who,  when 
ready,  refuses  to  enter  the  domestic  relation. 
To  be  sure  he  has  his  grounds,  sometimes  suffi- 
cient, but  mostly  insufficient,  for  not  assuming 
his  share  in  the  institutional  task  of  humanity. 


THE  FAMILY.  107 

Negative  is  his  conduct,  whatever  be  the  reason ; 
if  all  were  to  do  as  he  does,  there  would  be  no 
Family,  and  soon  no  human  race.  Thus  he  gives 
a  blow  to  the  Institution  from  the  outside  like 
that  of  Fate,  though  his  separation  from  the 
Family  be  simply  passive.  Such  a  person,  by 
refusing  to  enter  the  grand  institutional  move- 
ment of  mankind  at  its  starting-point,  denies  his 
own  principle  of  existence  at  its  fountain-head. 

Celibacy  may,  of  course,  be  founded  on  good 
reasons.  Conscientious  people  have  been  known 
to  renounce  love  and  even  to  break  off  a  matri- 
monial engagement  on  account  of  an  hereditary 
taint  in  the  blood,  such  as  insanity,  consumption, 
scrofula.  They  renounce  the  Family  for  the 
sake  of  the  Family.  Then  the  ups  and  downs  of 
life  may  turn  marriage  down,  even  after  one 
or  several  fair  trials.  But  the  great  rule  is  that 
every  individual  get  married,  and  thereby  become 
a  truly  free  being,  that  is  institutionally  free. 
Unmarried  he  can  be  capriciously  free,  but  such 
freedom  is  logically  at  the  expense  of  his  race. 

Religion  has  sometimes  felt  itself  compelled  in 
certain  cases  to  enforce  celibacy  upon  its  vo- 
taries—  a  phenomenon  which  has  appeared  both 
in  the  Orient  and  the  Occident.  When  the 
initiate  of  a  given  class  (priest  or  monk)  enters 
the  divine  Family,  he  must  renounce  the  secular 
Family,  between  which  is  supposed  to  lie  an  in- 
herent contradiction.      Whatever   be  the  ground 


108  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

justifying  monasticism  in  some  ages  and  coun- 
tries, it  will  hardly  hold  for  the  modern  world 
except  in  exceptions. 

Such  are,  in  general,  the  negative  forces  assail- 
ing and  destroying  the  Family  from  the  out- 
side—  forces  coming  from  Nature  (in  death), 
from  the  Family  itself  (in  its  growth),  and  from 
the  Individual  (through  his  abstention),  who  can 
destroy  like  Nature.  Thus  the  latter  has  shown 
a  negative  power  which  is  next  to  be  seen  at 
work  inside  the  Family,  after  the  marriage-tie 
has  been  formed. 

II.  The  Family  Assailed  from  Within.  — 
Already  we  have  noticed  the  unity  of  the  sexual 
pair  in  Marriage,  Avhich  unity  properly  springs 
from  and  rests  upon  an  emotion,  love.  This  in- 
ner bond  of  the  Family  can  be  assailed  by  the 
married  individual,  as  he  (or  she)  is  still  a  self- 
determined  being ;  in  the  Institution  he  can  still 
refuse  subordination  to  the  Institution,  and  break 
the  bond  in  tvvain. 

Thus  Marriaofe  dissolves  into  its  orisfinal 
elements,  the  two  sexual  individuals,  and  the  at- 
traction of  love  is  succeeded  by  the  repulsion  of 
hate.  The  union  which  was  sealed  by  the  three 
Confirmations  is  torn  asunder  by  the  destroying 
agencies  being  waked  up,  which  were  put  to  sleep 
by  love  and  its  institutional  consecration. 

At  this  point  we  enter  the  chief  problem  of  the 
Family,  especially  of  the  monogamous  Family. 


THE  FAMILY.  109 

How  shall  the  bond  between  the  sexual  twain  be 
kept  pure  and  permanent,  and  thereby  fulfill  the 
end  of  the  Family?  Beino-  twofold  primordially, 
it  has  always  the  tendency  to  reversion,  which 
can  be  provoked  into  activity  in  various  ways. 
Whereof  we  may  note  the  following:  — 

(1)  A  new  emotion  may  be  roused  by  a  new 
person,  who  appears  in  the  intercourse  of  human 
life.  Thus  Love  may  assail  Love,  the  institu- 
tional feeling  may  be  attacked  and  undermined 
by  the  very  inclination  whence  it  arose.  This  is 
the  grand  hazard  in  all  Marriage.  Other  individ- 
uals  are  always  crossing  the  path  of  both  hus- 
band and  wife,  and  exciting  new  emotions  and 
new  affinities,  which  may  become  virulent  and 
disintegrating  to  the  union  already  formed. 

Such  is  the  everlasting  exposure  of  the  domes- 
tic Institution  to  the  chances  of  the  world  on  the 
one  hand  and  to  the  changeful  subjective  nature 
of  the  individual  on  the  other.  A  return  to  that 
inner  starting-point  of  the  Family  is  always  pos- 
sible, a  reversion,  as  it  were,  to  its  birth.  To  be 
sure  duty,  honor,  religion  ought  to  suppress  the 
rising  demon,  but  may  not  be  able.  Incompati- 
bility between  the  husband  and  wife  has  usually 
its  source  in  this  third  person  who  has  secretly 
taken  the  place  of  one  or  the  other. 

Literature,  especially  in  the  novel,  has  held  up 
to  man  the  slow  dissolution  of  the  married  pair 
through  the  rising  emotion  which  overturns  the 


no  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Family.  In  this  repect  the  novel  of  all  novels  is 
Goethe's  Elective  Affinities  (  Wahlverioandt- 
scJiaften). 

(2)  Divorce  is  the  complete  outer  manifesta- 
tion of  this  inner  or  possible  separation.  The 
law  is  invoked  to  undo  that  which  it  has  done ; 
the  State  as  the  Institution  which  is  to  make 
Free- Will  valid,  is  called  upon  to  release  each 
party  from  the  common  promise,  when  the  inner 
foundation  of  Marriage  is  destroyed.  The  union 
may  become  completely  destructive  of  Free-Will 
in  the  individual,  then  the  law  has  to  step  in  or 
fail  of  its  purpose. 

Divorce  is,  on  tlicAvhole,  a  phase  of  the  great 
movement  of  freedom,  though  it  certainly  can 
be  abused.  Doubtless  the  woman  receives  the 
Greater  benefit  from  divorce  which  has  been  made 
easier  chiefly  in  order  to  protect  the  personality 
of  the  wife,  when  she  is  the  victim  of  cruelty, 
drunkenness,  or  neglect  on  the  part  of  the  hus- 
band. The  Family  is  to  actualize  Free-Will,  not 
to  destroy  it;  when  the  latter  happens,  the  State 
has  to  perform  its  duty,  which  is  to  preserve 
Free-Will.  The  law  of  divorce  should  not  be 
too  lax,  nor*  too  strict.  Agitation  to  limit 
divorce  is  well  enough,  but  this  is  not  to  be  abso- 
lutely prohibited.  Divorce  within  proper  bounds 
has  a  tendency  to  prevent  worse  things  than 
itself;  often  the  illicit  union  will  be  formed 
if    the    legal    one    is    impossible,    as    such     a 


THE  FAMILY.  Ill 

law  is  felt  to  violate  the  very  })urp()se  of  all 
law. 

The  individual  having  failed  in  his  tirst  attempt 
to  found  a  Family  through  no  fault  of  his  own, 
is  not  to  be  shut  off  forever  from  domestic  life 
for  that  reason.  Particularly  the  woman  is  to  be 
protected  in  her  divine  right  of  being  a  home- 
maker.  A  divorce  law  absolutely  prohibitive  may 
work  the  deepest  injustice  and  cause  greater  evils 
than  it  can  possibly  remedy.  It  is  really  anti- 
institutional,  for  it  can  prevent  man  and  woman 
from  entering  the  domestic  Institution  for  all 
time,  because  *f  one  mistake  made  often  under 
extenuating  circumstances.  But  even  if  trans- 
gression and  not  mistake  be  the  cause,  certainly 
the  transgressor  can  repent  and  be  restored  to  his 
first  right.  The  Catholic  Church  makes  marriage 
one  of  the  Sacraments  and  regards  the  matri- 
monial tie  as  indissoluble  except  by  papal  dis- 
pensation ;  some  Protestants  hold  essentially  the 
same  view.  Marriage  is  to  have  a  divine  Con- 
firmation, as  we  have  seen ;  but  when  the  Family 
turns  to  an  Inferno,  Heaven  must  permit  or 
rather  cannot  prevent  its  self-dissolution. 

(3)  Free  Love  (so-called)  is  the  abolition  of 
all  institutional  confirmation  of  Marriage,  abro- 
gating Family,  State  and  Church,  and  carrying 
the  sexual  pair  back  to  their  primal  emotional 
basis.  Such  a  domestic  condition  is  declared  by 
its  promoters  to  be  a  great  advance  toward  free- 


112  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

(lorn,  but  really  it  is  a  relapse  to  the  first  caprice 
of  passion.  Free  Love  is  not  merely  an  emotion, 
but  a  doctrine  which  is  defended  with  argument. 
It  affirms  that  Marriage,  at  least  monogamous  Mar- 
riage, is  a  failure  :  thus  it  becomes  negative  to  the 
institutional  Family  while  seeking  to  realize  anew 
the  Family.  Free  Love  takes  many  forms,  low 
and  high ;  in  its  highest  form  it  endeavors  to  se- 
cure the  permanent  element  of  the  Family  by  a 
new  society  or  community  removed  from  the 
ordinary  institutional  life  of  man.  Kot  only  a 
new  domestic  and  social  order  but  a  new  religion 
oftens  springs  out  of  this  tendency,  or  possibly  it 
springs  from  the  religion. 

Mormonism  is  a  curious  reversion  to  the  polyga- 
mous Orient  in  the  heart  of  the  monogamous 
Occident,  accompanied  with  a  new  political  and 
ecclesiastical  organization,  which  was  intended 
to  reform  the  evils  of  Western  civilization,  as  its 
claim  runs. 

Communism  has  as  its  primary  purpose  the 
abolition  of  private  property,  but  often  it  in- 
cludes also  the  abolition  of  the  Family  as  an  in- 
dependent Listitution,  whose  place  is  taken  by 
the  communit}'.  The  great  end  of  the  Family, 
which  is  the  reproduction  of  the  institutional  per- 
son, is  transformed  into  the  reproduction  of  the 
communal  person,  the  child  being  born  into  and 
reared  by  the  community  for  its  end.  The  most 
famous  and  most  successful  as  well  as  most  re- 


TEE  FAMILY.  118 

volutionary  of  all  these  communistic  schemes  is 
(or  was)  that  known  as  the  Oneida  community, 
whose  history,  however,  is  properly  a  phase  of 
the  Religious  Institution. 

Thus  we  see  generated  in  the  Family  negative 
forces  which  turn  upon  it  and  seek  to  destroy  it. 
Such  a  neo;ative  force  may  spring  out  of  its  emo- 
tional fountain,  love,  and  carry  this  inner  separa- 
tion forward  into  an  outer  legal  dissolution  of 
marriage.  But  the  institutional  side  of  the 
Family  also  may  give  rise  to  a  destructive  move- 
ment which  aims  to  abolish  the  Family  as  such 
and  to  assign  its  function  to  another  Institution. 
The  monogamous  Family  is  declared  unable  to 
fulfill  the  purpose  of  its  existence,  and  therefore 
must  be  supplanted  by  some  arrangement  which 
can.  But  the  unquestionable  tendency  of  com- 
munism in  the  matter  of  wives  is  the  following. 

III.  The  Perverted  Family.  The  negative 
sweep  of  the  Family  ends  not  only  in  destruction 
but  in  organized  destruction.  A  domestic  In- 
stitution rises  whose  end  is  to  destroy  the  end  of 
the  domestic  Institution.  The  individual,  spe- 
cially the  woman,  becoming  an  outcast  from  the 
Family,  is  still  going  to  have  her  Family,  in 
accord  with  her  domestic  nature,  yet  directly 
hostile  to  the  real  Family.  She  still  makes  a 
Home,  but  it  is  a  negative  Home  in  opposition  to 
the  true  Home.  Here  we  behold  that  phenome- 
non commonly  known  as  "  the  social  evil,"  which 


1J4  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

is  an  organized  Family  with  its  Home  whose  pur- 
pose is  to  undo  the  Family  and  Home. 

Thus  the  positive  and  negative  elements  of  the 
Family  have  developed  into  their  fiercest  dualism, 
standing  front  to  front  in  conflict.  Both  are 
present  everywhere,  though  in  urban  life  the 
Perverted  Family  is  most  pronounced  and  undis- 
guised, seeking  to  annihilate  the  institutional 
Family  by  destroying  its  end,  which  is  the  repro- 
duction of  the  institutional  individual.  This 
Perverted  Family  is  the  culmination  of  what  we 
have  above  called  the  Negative  Family,  which 
now  has  its  own  active  domestic  organization, 
and  is  the  complete  antithesis  of  the  Positive 
Family. 

Here,  too,  we  can  discern  several  stages  which 
take  the  form  of  lapses  or  reversions  to  previous 
less  advanced  conditions  of  the  Family.  In  all 
societies  we  note  a  downward  development  of  the 
Institution  by  the  side  of  and  in  a  struggle  with 
its  upward  development. 

(1)  We  may  place  as  first  the  monogamous 
lapse,  in  which  the  sexual  pair  come  together  in 
a  perverted  union,  yet  remain  faithful  to  each 
other,  one  to  one  in  the  bond  of  love  it  may  be, 
yet  outside  the  Family.  This  is  usually  the 
most  subtle,  most  hidden,  and  probably  the 
most  pernicious  of  the  forms  of  the  Negative 
Family.  Two  households,  as  it  were,  the  one 
institutional,   the    other    anti-institutional;   each 


THE  FAMILY.  115 

also  monogamous,  taken  by  itself;  thus  is  the 
human  being  torn  in  twain,  his  heart  on  one  side, 
while  law,  duty,  and  conscience  are  on  the  other. 
The  case  may  happen  and  only  too  often  does 
happen  that  the  emotional  and  institutional  ele- 
ments which  ought  to  be  united  into  one  Family 
are  separated  into  two  Families,  the  open  and 
the  concealed,  the  acknowledged  and  the  unac- 
knowledged, the  confirmed  and  the  unconfirmed, 
one  of  Law  and  the  other  of  Love. 

(2)  A  further  descent  is  the  polygamous 
lapse,  which  has  indeed  already  shown  itself 
secretly  in  the  previous  stage,  when,  for  instance, 
the  man  or  the  woman  has  two  households,  or 
belongs  to  both  a  positive  and  a  negative  Family. 
But  the  complete  manifestation  of  this  lapse  is 
seen  when  the  sexual  individual  renounces  all 
fidelity  to  the  one  person,  when  the  woman  drops 
down  to  polyandry  (many  men),  and  the  man  to 
polygyny  (many  women).  Thus  the  monoga- 
mous relation  is  completely  negated. 

We  shall  see  in  the  next  section  (on  the  Evo- 
lution of  the  Family)  that  all  these  forms  of 
polygamy  appear  in  the  historic  development  of 
the  domestic  Institution.  In  such  case  they 
belong  to  the  positive  progress  of  man  toward 
the  higher  Family ;  but  when  man  drops  back 
into  them  from  the  higher  Family,  they  are 
turned  into  the  movement  of  his  descent,  and 
what   was  once   a  stage  of  advance  becomes  a 


116  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

stage  of  retrogression.  The  reversion  is  the 
perversion ;  to  go  back  to  polygamy  from  mo- 
nogamy is  decadence ;  to  rise  to  polygamy  out  of 
mere  promiscuity  of  the  sexes  is  progress. 

(3)  Herein  we  reach  the  last  stage  of  des- 
cent—  sexual  promiscuity.  Such  is  the  name 
which  investigators  have  given  to  the  primal  con- 
dition of  the  human  animal,  that  potential  state 
in  which  the  first  germs  of  the  institutional  Fam- 
ily begin  to  appear.  But  as  a  reversion  of  the 
monogamous  Family  it  exhibits  man  in  the  most 
degraded  social  condition,  he  has  sunk  not  to 
animality  but  to  bestiality.  For  animality  maj- 
mean  innocence  or  even  ascent,  but  bestiality 
means  the  fall,  truly  the  fall  of  Satan  from  the 
top  to  the  very  bottom.  The  dog  as  dog  is  an 
animal  simply,  and  we  let  his  instinctive  promis- 
cuity pass,  but  man  as  dog  is  a  beast,  whom 
Dante  transforms  into  a  monster  part  human 
and  part  animal,  and  puts  down  into  the  Inferno. 

In  most  communities,  certainly  in  every  large 
city,  is  a  patch  given  up  to  sexual  promiscuity, 
which  seems  able  to  assert  itself  along  with  every 
advancing  step  of  civilization.  So  powerful,  so 
inborn  in  human  nature  is  this  tendency  to  rever- 
sion, that  sometimes  one  thinks  that  it  increases 
with  the  increased  tension  which  comes  with  all 
higher  evolution.  What  to  do  with  this  plague- 
spot  is  a  chief  if  not  the  chief  social  problem  of 
modern  reformers.     Sometimes  it  has  been  sup- 


THE  FAMILY.  117 

pressed  with  violence,  but  then  the  poison  has 
been  found  working  outwards  into  healthy  por- 
tions of  the  social  organism,  which  seems  always 
to  have  corners  just  ready  to  be  infected  and  on 
the  point  of  reverting  to  some  transcended  stage. 
In  such  a  tension  do  we  live  and  hover  between 
the  upwards  and  the  downwards  of  the  Family. 

Thus  we  have  traced  the  neo-ative  forces  at  work 
in  the  F.imily  and  have  seen  it  revert  in  a  de- 
scending line  to  its  original  sexual  units,  man  and 
woman.  The  domestic  Institution  is  continually 
being  resolved  back  into  its  very  beginning,  which 
process  is  going  on  in  the  midst  of  our  highest 
civilization.  Are  we  then  doomed  to  revert  to 
the  animal,  and  in  such  a  cataclysm  are  our  spir- 
itual acquisitions  destined  to  be  lost?  There  can 
be  little  doubt  that  certain  races  have  so  reverted, 
leavinof  a  few  faint  signs  of  their  civilization  be- 
hind  in  the  works  of  their  ancestors. 

But  with  all  the  foregoing  facts  granted,  there 
is  still  an  answer  to  this  pessimistic  view  of  hu- 
man development.  Along  with  the  before-men- 
tioned negative  forces  of  the  Family  is  found 
another  energy  which  is  continually  overcoming 
them,  turning  negation  upon  itself  and  thus 
transforming  it  into  the  positive  principle.  The 
Negative  Family  must  at  last  serve  up  its  own 
inner  character  to  itself,  nmst  destroy  its  own 
destructive  element.  This  is  essentially  the 
movement  of  Evolution,  which  has  been  so  fully 


118  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

taken  up  bj  the  soul  of  the  present  age  as  one  of 
its  prime  spiritual  needs.  Accordingly  we  shall 
now  look  at  the  Evolution  of  the  Family,  in 
which  we  shall  see  every  previous  negative  stage 
of  the  domestic  Institution  overcome  from  within, 
self -undone  and  transcended,  whereby  is  revealed 
the  genetic  history  of  the  Institution. 


III.  The  Evolution  of  the  Family. 

We  have  just  witnessed  the  process  of  descent 
and  disintegration  which  is  at  work  continually  in 
the  Family,  as  it  exists  in  the  most  civilized  socie- 
ties. This  destructive  side  is  now  to  meet  with  a 
constructive,  ever-progressing  principle,  which  is 
the  grand  modern  talisman  of  thought  and  sci- 
ence — Evolution.  As  we  had  a  fall,  so  now  we  are 
to  have  an  ascent,  an  overcoming  of  the  negative 
energy  just  unfolded.  If  man  can  drop  back  to 
the  animal  out  of  his  institutional  heritage,  he 
can  rise  from  the  animal,  has  indeed  thus  risen. 
Evolution  is  the  real  answer  of  the  age  to  denial, 
to  skepticism,  to  pessimism,  being  a  natural  his- 
tory of  the  human  race  transcending  its  own  neg- 
ative forces. 

Still  Evolution  is  not  the  complete  process  of 
the  Institution,  but  a  phase  or  stage  of  it,  as  we 
have  already  set  forth.  It  cannot  be  left  out  of 
the  complete  treatment  of  the  Family,  yet  is  not 


IRE  FAMILY.  119 

by  itself  the  complete  treatment,  as  some  one- 
sided evolutionists  seem  to  think.  Indeed,  it  is 
meaningless  as  a  method  or  as  a  thought  without 
the  corresponding  descent  or  disintegration ;  more- 
over it  takes  for  granted  a  positive,  more  or  less 
advanced  condition  of  the  Family  toward  which 
it  has  moved  and  is  still  moving. 

Evolution,  therefore,  we  place  as  the  third 
stage  or  phase  in  the  total  process  of  the 
Family.  We  shall  find  in  its  movement  the  idea 
of  man's  return  to  his  true  estate;  we,  contem- 
plating the  doctrine  of  Evolution,  behold  the  res- 
toration of  man  and  of  the  social  order  out  of 
their  threatened  dissolution.  It  is  not  simply  a 
scientific  fact,  but  it  has  a  power  of  spiritual 
healing ;  through  it  we  see  a  continual  rise  and 
return  to  the  positive  condition  of  the  Family ; 
we  see  not  merely  the  generation  of  the  Institu- 
tution,  but  also  its  regeneration,  which  is,  first  of 
all,  to  take  place  in  our  hearts,  and  to  become  a 
part  of  ourselves. 

Truly  a  spiritual  catharsis  has  come  to  our  age 
in  the  doctrine  of  Evolution,  which  may  almost 
lay  claim  to  being  a  new  Gospel.  It  has  passed 
out  of  the  hands  of  the  scientist,  and  has  entered 
the  spirit  of  the  time  as  a  renewed  faith  in  the 
destiny  of  the  race,  saving  many  earnest  souls 
from  pessimism  and  despair.  It  makes  for  free- 
dom, we  hold,  carrying  Nature  herself  always  up 
toward  the  self-determined.     Evolution  is  indeed 


120  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

variously  read  by  its  supporters,  some  will  see  in 
it  only  the  iron  necessity  of  physical  law.  But 
it  surely  points  to  and  in  fact  presupposes  a  "Will, 
an  Ego  at  the  center  of  all  things.  It  calls  for 
the  complete  circle  of  which  it  is  the  segment, 
and  such  a  circle  must  ultimatel}'^  be  self -evolved, 
in  fact  the  total  absolute  Self. 

Coming  back  to  the  Family  we  found  that  its 
dissolution  in  the  previous  stage  ended  in  the  na- 
tural individual  and  reduced  man  to  his  starting- 
point.  Now  while  the  Family  has  this  backward 
movement  in  modern  societjs  this  tendency  to 
drop  down  to  its  primitive  unit,  to  its  beginning, 
equally  certain  is  it  that  the  Family  has  shown 
the  counter  movement  in  a  much  stronger  tend- 
ency, the  rise  from  the  physical  individual  of 
nature  to  the  institutional  individual  of  spirit. 

This  very  negative  movement  of  the  modern 
Family  involves  the  positive  one,  the  lapse  must 
have  its  counterpart  in  the  ascent.  Hence  the 
present  upward  movement  is  the  negation  of  the 
negative  forces  already  set  forth ;  the  history  of 
the  Family  is  just  the  overcoming  of  the  destruc- 
tive might  of  nature,  passion,  appetite  —  is  the 
transcending  of  the  lower  more  inadequate  stages 
of  the  Family. 

Much  attention  has  been  paid  in  recent  years 
to  the  Evolution  of  the  Family  by  a  number  of 
patient  investigators,  and  an  enormous  mass  of 
facts  has  been   collected.     Naturally  there  have 


THE  FAMILY.  121 

been  various  attempts  to  organize  this  decidedly 
recalcitrant  mass  into  an  ordered  Whole,  which 
IS  to  take  its  due  place  in  the  science 'of  Institu- 
tions. 

In  the  rise  of  the  Family,  we  behold  three 
main  stages,  which  have  an  inner  relation  of 
growth,  and  which  we  shall  epitomize  before 
proceeding  to  a  more  detailed  exposition  in  the 
following    outline :  — 

I.  Natural  Monogamy ;  this  involves  the  union 
of  one  male  and  one  female  during  the  pairing 
time,  during  gestation,  and  during  the  helpless 
period  of  physical  infancy. 

II.  Polygamy ;  the  breaking  up  the  immediate 
Monogamy  of  Nature,  by  having  a  plurality  of 
males  or  females  or  both  in  the  unity  of  the 
Family. 

III.  Institutional  Monogamy ;  the  return  to 
the  union  of  one  male  and  one  female,  which, 
however,  is  no  longer  the  Natural  Family  merely, 
but  is  the  Institutional  Family,  which  has  passed 
through  and  cast  off  Polygamy. 

As  the  sexual  relation  is  common  to  man  and 
the  lowest  animals,  and  as  there  are  all  grada- 
tions of  it,  one  may  well  ask :  at  what  point  does 
the  Family  start  into  being?  Or  when  can  Mar- 
riage be  said  to  exist?  It  is  not  easy  to  draw  the 
line  with  precision,  still  some  limit  has  to  be  seen, 
even  if  vaguely  seen.  As  the  great  end  of  the 
Family  is  the  having  and  rearing  of  offspring,  so 


122 


SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 


la- 


this end  must  manifest  itself  in  the  pair  when- 
ever they  begin  to  show  themselves  parents, 
though  in  the  most  primitive  way. 

Accordingly  the  Family  involves  the  union  of 
the  opposite  sexes,  the  duration  of  such  union 
till  after  the  birth  of  the  offspring,  and  the  pro- 
vision for  them  till  they  are  able  to  help  them- 
selves. As  the  offspring  of  man  remains  helpless 
a  long  time,  the  Human  Family  has  an  inherent 
tendency  to  be  permanent.  Then  as  the  human 
child  requires  something  far  more  than  mere 
physical  independence,  Marriage  grows  to  be  the 
matter  of  a  life-time.  The  movement  of  this 
growth  from  its  natural  stage  up  to  its  institu- 
tional fullness  is  what  we  shall  now  follow. 

I.  Natural  MoNOGAJiY.  The  immediate  start- 
ing-point of  Nature  in  the  reproduction  of  the 
species  may  be  said  to  be  monogamous ;  it  is  the 
relation  of  one  to  one  and  can  be  nothing  else. 
Still  further.  Nature  seems  to  choose  its  own, 
individual  selects  individual  by  an  inner  impulse 
or  inclination ;  animals  show  choice  in  taking 
their  mates.  In  man  this  affinity  of  individuals 
becomes  more  pronounced,  and  is  called  love. 
Out  of  a  mass  of  individuals  of  both  sexes,  each 
seeks  and  finds  just  the  one  and  none  other. 
To  this  passion  of  love  there  rises,  under  provo- 
cation and  sometimes  almost  without  provocation, 
its  violent  negative  counterpart,  namely  the  pas- 
sion of  jealousy. 


THE  FAMILY.  123 

Man  and  the  lower  animals  have  these  three 
fundamental  emotions,  or  rather  passions,  of  the 
Family  —  sexuality,  love  of  the  individual  as 
such,  and  jealous}^  The  whole  movement  of 
Evolution  will  show  these  passions  transforming 
themselves  out  of  their  physical  manifestation 
and  bearing  man  upwards  into  an  ethical,  that  is, 
institutional  life. 

All  three  of  these  passions  may  be  said  to  be 
in  their  very  nature  monogamous.  They  affirm 
decisively  that  this  one  is  mine,  hands  oft",  or  a 
fio-ht.     The    chief  source  of  the  bitterest  struo- 

o  ~ 

gles  among  animals  and  among  savages  is  Mo- 
nogamy, which  is  always  being  assailed  and 
always  being  defended.  Nor  are  such  struggles 
unknown  among  civilized  men. 

The  result  is  that  the  state  of  Natural  Monog- 
amy is  not  a  placid,  peaceful  condition  of  domes- 
tic happiness,  as  has  been  sometimes  imagined. 
On  the  contrary,  there  is  in  it  fierce  conflict, 
coupled  with  deep  difference  and  opposition. 
The  process  of  natural  Evolution,  like  birth 
itself,  is  accompanied  with  throes  of  struggle, 
which  is  manifest  from  the  great  diversity  seen 
in  the  state  of  Nature. 

The  reader  must  always  bear  in  mind  that  we 
are  now  considering  the  Monogamy  of  Nature, 
which  is  far  enough  from  being  pure  and  con- 
stant; on  the  contrary,  it  is  very  fluctuating  and 
uncertain,  boinir  not  vet  made  stable  l)v  Law  and 


124  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Institution,  but  subjected  to  the  caprice  and  vio- 
lence of  the  phj'^sical  individual.  Still  here  is  the 
germ  Avhich  is  to  develop  into  the  institutional 
Family  —  the  germ  found  in  Nature  herself,  who 
may  thus  be  declared  to  have  a  monogamous  ten- 
dency ;  truly  she  has  a  monogamous  ideal  in  her 
soul,  M'hich  she  will  slowly  realize  with  the  ages. 

The  present  is  an  undeveloped  potential  stage, 
with  all  sorts  of  exceptions  and  variations,  3'et 
with  one  advancing  main  movement.  We  shall 
briefly  give  traces  of  it  in  the  lower  orders  of 
animate  existence,  not  forgetting  to  mark  the 
fluctuations  sideward  and  even  backward  which 
are  characteristic  of  the  stage  before  us. 

1.  It  would  appear  that  the  first  decisiv^e  in- 
stances of  the  Monogamy  of  Nature  occur  among 
the  Birds.  Below  them,  the  sexual  relation  of 
Invertebrates  and  Vertebrates  seems  to  be  wholly 
inconstant,  and  even  parental  care  for  the  young 
is  hardily  discernible.  Some  exceptions  have 
been  noted  by  naturalists ;  but  the  general  rule 
appears  to  be  that  reproduction  of  kind  begins 
and  ends  with  the  immediate  sexual  instinct. 

But  with  what  seems  almost  a  sudden  spring, 
among  the  Birds  Monogamy  appears  in  a  very 
l^ronounced  form.  Parental  care  of  the  young  is 
shown  by  the  mother,  and  also  what  is  rarer,  b}- 
the  father.  Both  work  together  in  building  the 
nest,  in  feeding  the  young,  even  in  hatching  out 
the  eggs.     Both  look  after  the  fledgelings,  and 


THE  FAMILY.  Ub 

defend  them  in  case  of  necessity,  till  they  become 
able  to  shift  for  themselves.  Thus  the  end  of 
the  Family  is  attained. 

Such  is  the  first  picture  of  Natural  Monogamy, 
striking  and  beautiful,  even  an  example  to  man. 
Brehm,  the  famous  naturalist,  declares  that  true 
marriao-e  is  found  only  amonoj  the  Birds.  The 
little  child  playing  Birdling  in  the  nest  and  the 
Mother-bird,  is  learnino^  the  first  lesson  of  Monoo'- 
am}',  and  unfolding  the  unconscious  instinct  of 
the  Family. 

It  is  true  that  not  all  Birds  are  monogamous 
nor  are  they  all  good  examples  of  domestic  fidel- 
ity. Very  familiar  is  the  old  rooster  strutting 
amid  his  polygamous  household  in  the  barn-yard. 
In  fact,  the  fowls  of  the  air  will  show  every  stage 
of  domesticity,  from  the  utterly  faithless  cuckoo 
laying  its  egg  in  another's  nest,  to  the  love-bird 
which  is  said  to  pine  away  and  die  over  its  dead 
mate,  united  in  life  and  in  death. 

2.  But  when  Ave  come  to  the  Mammals  another 
law  seems  to  prevail.  The  paradise  of  the  Bird- 
family  is  broken  up ;  Polygamy  in  many  grades  and 
forms  enters  the  animal  kingdom.  The  father 
for  the  mostpart  disburdens  himself  of  the  care  of 
his  offspring;  the  mother,  however,  makes  up 
his  deficiency,  nursing  and  providing  for  her 
young  Avith  strong  affection.  At  this  stage  there 
is  among  brutes  a  kind  of  Matriarchate  or  rule  of 
the   mother,  the  father  being  often  left  out  or 


126  SOCIAL  I.VSTITUTIOI^S. 

actually  driven  off  by  her,  as  he  shows  himself 
useless,  or  sometimes  positively  hostile  to  his 
own  offspring.  Yet  even  among  the  lower  Mam- 
mals we  do  not  find  by  any  means  uniformity  in 
this  matter;  the  males  in  certain  cases,  as  the 
■whale,  the  seal,  the  rein-deer  (see  Westermark, 
The  History  of  Human  Marriage ^  p.  12),  and 
other  animals,  stay  with  the  mother  after  the 
birth  of  the  young,  and  protect  the  family. 

3.  But  when  we  reach  the  Quadrumana,  the 
highest  among  Mammals,  the  law  seems  to  change 
gradually  back  again  toward  Monogamy.  Un- 
doubtedly many  species  of  the  monkey  and  the 
ape  are  polygamous.  But  the  simang,  the  orang- 
outang, and  other  man-like  apes  show  decided 
leaniugs  toward  a  monogamous  state.  The  males, 
though  often  separated  from  the  females,  are 
seen  with  the  young,  evidently  caring  for  them 
and  defending  them,  thus  sho wins'  some  degree 
of  paternal  responsibility,  which  naturally  springs 
from  a  monogamous  relation,  at  least  among 
animals. 

The  Gorilla,  which  is  usually  considered  the 
animal  nearest  to  man,  has  an  interesting  history 
in  this  connection.  Mr.  Darwin  considers  the 
Gorilla  to  be  a  polygamist  (^Descent  of  Man, 
Univ.  Ed.,  p.  245),  but  later  observers  declare 
that  the  male  and  female  live  with  their  young  in 
one  family.  Both  statements  are  probably  true ; 
the  Gorilla  has  his  wife    and    familv,  which  he 


THE  FAMILY.  127 

protects;  but  he  has  also  been  obteerved  taking  a 
free  range  of  the  tropical  forest.  His  stronger 
instinct  is  probably  monogamous,  but  that  does 
not  hinder  him  from  showing  polygamous  lapses. 
What  Darwin  cites  in  reference  to  a  much  lower 
animal,  has  pertinence  in  this  connection  ;  "  the 
lion  in  South  Africa  sometimes  lives  with  a  single 
female,  but  generally  with  more." 

The  foregoing  stage  of  the  animal  Family  ( in- 
cluding man)  is  evidentl}'^  an  uncertain,  fluctuat- 
ing, somewhat  chaotic  stage.  We  call  it  Natural 
Monogamy,  since  its  general  trend  is  monogamous, 
though  amid  many  variations,  retrogressions, 
and  contradictory  tendencies.  There  is  yet  no 
fixed  law  of  the  Institution,  no  full  development 
of  the  rational,  permanent  element  of  the  Family. 
It  is  a  potential  state,  containing  the  future  of 
the  Family,  whose  threads  of  existence  are  here 
floating  in  a  sea  of  possibilities. 

There  has  been  in  recent  years  a  good  deal  of 
discussion  in  regard  to  the  beginnings  of  human 
marriage.  Most  anthropologists  have  believed 
that  primitive  man  and  woman  lived  in  a  state  of 
[)romiscuity  ;  there  was  no  marriage  of  individual 
to  individual,  but  "  a  communal  marriage;  "  that 
is,  the  whole  community  or  tribe  of  males  and 
females  dwelt  together  in  promiscuous  intercourse, 
and  the  children  belonged  to  the  tribe  or  per- 
chance to  the  mother  alone.  Polyandry,  still 
existent  among  a  good  many  tribes  in  different 


128  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

parts  of  the  globe,  is  supposed  by  Mr.  M'Len- 
nan  and  others  to  imply  a  previous  condition  of 
promiscuity  in  the  sexual  relation. 

On  the  contrary  it  has  been  stoutly  affirmed  that 
no  such  state  of  promiscuity  has  ever  been  found 
among  primitive  races,  in  the  sense  of  being  a 
general  stage  of  the  domestic  development  of 
mankind.  "VVestermark  has  written  a  book  (^Tlie 
History  of  Human  Marriage)  whose  chief  ob- 
ject is  to  show  just  the  opposite.  He  brings 
together  a  great  deal  of  evidence  which  indicates 
that  the  lowest  races  of  man  as  well  as  the  high- 
est species  of  animals  are  in  the  main  monoga- 
mous. "  This  view  is  confirmed  by  many  of  the 
facts  adduced  in  Darwin's  Z^escen^  of  Man.  The 
work  of  Westermark  has  shaken,  if  not  refuted 
the  doctrine  of  promiscuity. 

The  reader  is  aware  from  the  preceding  expo- 
sition that  we  hold  the  view  of  Westermark  to  be 
strongly  confirmed  by  psychology.  The  original 
psychical  nature  of  man  leads  him,  yea  drives 
him  towards  Monogamy.  Those  three  funda- 
mental passions,  bringing  man  and  woman  to- 
gether and  cementing  them  into  the  unity  of  the 
Family  —  sexuality,  love,  and  jealousy  —  are  pri- 
marily monogamous,  are  deeply  at  work  in  the 
heart  of  the  savage,  and  even  of  the  animal. 
The  inner  movement  of  the  soul  thus  corresponds 
to  the  outer  movement  of  the  fact  which  has  been 
so  copiously  set  forth  by  "Westermark  in  his  book. 


THE  FAMILY.  129 

We  cannot  help  adding  that  Westermark  shows 
one  grand  fatality :  he  has  no  psychology  and 
hence  no  true  ordering  principle  in  his  work,  for 
his  so-called  scientific  method  is  not  only  shallow 
but  chaotic.  Still  he  has  given  us  a  very  suggest- 
ive piece  of  work  to  which  we  gladly  confess  our 
obligations. 

Plainly  does  it  appear  that  the  soul  of  Nature 
herself,  as  far  as  she  manifests  herself  in  the 
domestic  instinct,  strives  to  be  monoganous ;  Mar- 
riage in  its  faintest  beginning,  and,  as  we  shall 
see  later,  in  its  most  highly  developed  end,  means 
the  one  male  and  the  one  female  in  union.  We 
say  that  Nature  strives  in  this  stage,  for  Natural 
Monogamy  is  a  grand  striving  with  many  turns 
and  lapses  and  recoils  —  a  mighty  struggle  toward 
an  ideal  end. 

But  this  ideal  end  is  not  to  be  attained  imme- 
diately, the  Family  has  to  pass  through  a  new 
discipline.  The  Monogamy  of  Nature  we  see 
everywhere  in  a  state  of  change  and  dissolution, 
being  exposed  to  all  the  caprices  of  untamed  pas- 
sion, which  belongs  to  animal  and  savage  life. 
The  three  passions  already  mentioned,  which 
primarily  tend  to  Monogamy,  easily  turn  to  an 
assault  on  the  same.  The  strong  man  of  the 
tribe,  led  by  his  appetite  or  his  love,  will  take 
by  force  the  wife  of  the  weaker  man.  The  result 
is  a  dual  condition  shows  itself:  the  chieftains 
have  several  wives  in  a  community  which  is  other- 

9  . 


130  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

wise  monogamous.  Indeed  the  number  of  wives 
comes  to  indicate  the  superiority  of  the  ruler  over 
the  mass  of  his  subjects,  and  is  taken  as  mark 
of  his  wealth,  power  and  splendor.  Thus  dawns 
a  new  stage  in  the  social  history  of  the  race. 

II.  Polygamy.  In  this  stag-e  we  no  longer 
see  the  immediate  unity  of  one  male  and  one 
female  constituting  the  Family,  but  multiplicity 
enters,  first  on  the  one  side,  then  on  the  other, 
and  finally  on  both  sides  —  many  males  to  one 
female,  many  females  to  one  male,  and  also  many 
females  to  many  males.  Such  are  the  three  lead- 
ing forms  which  Polygamy  has  taken  in  the  Evo- 
lution of  the  Family. 

On  the  whole,  Polygamy  is  a  social  advance 
upon  Natural  Monogamy,  in  which  the  married 
relation  is  so  uncertain.  This  relation  now  be- 
comes more  fixed  and  stronger,  and  beo;ins  to  be 
institutional.  There  is  no  doubt  that  Polygamy 
has  been  the  training  of  mankind  out  of  the  Na- 
tural into  the  Spiritual  Monogamy  of  the  domestic 
Institution.  It  is  the  great  intermediate  stage 
in  the  total  Evolution  of  the  Family,  and  brings 
wdth  it  a  certain  degree  of  civilization.  More 
peoples,  who  may  be  called  civilized  on  this 
globe,  are  to-day  practicing  or  permitting  Polyg- 
amy by  law  and  custom,  than  make  up  the  total 
number  of  strictly  monogamous  peoples.  It 
may,  therefore,  be  considered  in  one  sense  a  more 
universal  phase  of   the  Family  than  any  other. 


THE  FAMILY.  131 

Still  we  must  be  careful  always  to  note  the 
reverse  side  of  the  picture :  in  a  polygamous 
society  very  few  can  be  practical  polygamists. 
First,  there  is  the  limit  of  nature,  which,  on  the 
whole,  brings  forth  one  woman  to  one-man. 
There  are  not  enough  females  born  on  the  earth, 
or  in  any  considerable  part  thereof,  to  supply 
every  man  with  even  two  wives.  As  already  said. 
Nature  is  fundamentally  monogamous,  and  asserts 
her  instinct  also  in  polygamous  countries.  In 
Egypt,  saj^s  Mr.  Lane,  not  one  husband  in  twenty 
has  two  wives.  According  to  Syed  Amir  Ali, 
more  than  ninety-five  per  cent  of  the  Moham- 
edans  in  India  are  at  the  present  moment,  either 
by  conviction  or  necessity,  monogamists.  In- 
deed the  custom  of  Polygamy  meets  with  decided 
disapprobation  among  many  educated  followers 
of  the  Prophet,  in  spite  of  his  example  and  the 
Koran.  The  same  holds  true  of  the  vast  quantit}'^ 
of  humanity  in  China,  Persia,  Siam,  Hindostan, 
and  other  Oriental  lands  where  Polygamy  exists 
(see  examples  in  Westermark,  op.  cit.  p.  438). 

In  the  second  place,  we  see  the  decided  social 
scission  produced  by  Polygamy  (or  specially  by 
Polygyny ) .  Many  wives  become  a  badge  of  dom- 
ination, of  pride,  of  distinction.  Thus  a  sepa- 
ration begins  to  show  itself  between  the  great 
mass  of  the  People  and  their  Rulers,  and  unavoid- 
ably a  conflict  sets  in,  which  often  involves  author- 
ity and  even  religion.     So  the  evolutionary  pro- 


132  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

cess  will  be  seen  in  many  phases  working  through 
Polygamy.  The  Orient  has  been  and  still  is 
polygamous,  but  owing  to  contact  with  the  West 
as  well  as  inner  causes,  there  is  a  strong  social 
fermentation  going  on  just  in  this  sphere  among 
its  most  advanced  peoples. 

Finally  we  cannot  help  observing  the  inner 
trouble  and  dissolution  which  must  be  always 
threatening  the  polygamous  Family.  Many  hus- 
bands or  many  wives  must  mean  many  quarrels. 
The  woman,  educated  and  independent,  will  in 
the  end  destroy  Polygamy,  and  this  is  really  the 
wedge  which  has  just  begun  to  enter  with  might 
Oriental  civilization. 

Still  it  is  curious  to  observe  how  deeply  in- 
grown with  human  consciousness  Polygamy  may 
become.  A  story  is  told  of  an  intelligent  chief, 
believing  in  progress,  but  a  polygamist,  who 
"was  perfectly  scandalized  at  the  utter  barba- 
rism" of  living  one's  whole  life  with  only  one 
wife,  and  never  parting  from  her  until  separated 
by  death.  Indeed  such  a  state  was  lower  than 
barbarism,  it  descended  to  animality,  being  "  just 
like  the  Wanderoo  monkeys  ' '  living  off  yonder 
in  the  woods  and  mountains.  In  one  sense  the 
chief  was  rio;ht.  He  had  observed  the  stage  of 
Natural  Monogamy  (seen  in  many  monkeys  and 
the  higher  Quadrumana,  which  are  monoga- 
mous), and  he  justly  deemed  his  own  polygamous 
state  as  more  advanced  than  that.     But  when  he 


THE  FAMILY.  133 

was  told  that  all  civilized  Europe  was  monoga- 
mous, he  was  deeply  shocked,  and  could  only  com- 
pare it  with  the  Wanderoo  monkeys,  and  pity 
such  a  civilization,  when  placed  beside  his  own. 
(See  T)ixvw\rv  s  Descent  of  Man, \]mv.^A.^\).  675.) 

Thus  we  find  an  inner  movement  or  evolution 
in  Polygamy,  of  which  we  have  already  noted 
three  kinds  or  stages.  Or  we  may  say  three 
forms  of  multiplicity  in  the  domestic  relation  in- 
stead of  unity  —  male  or  female  manyness  or 
both.  Which  of  these  stages  is  to  come  first? 
As  we  see  the  movement,  the  last  mentioned,  the 
plurality  of  both  wives  and  husbands  in  one  Fam- 
ily—  is  the  psychical  beginning,  though  this  can- 
not be  shown  to  be  always  the  strict  historical 
order. 

1.  The  first  stage  we  may  name  the  Consan- 
guine Marriage,  or  perchance  the  Punaluan  ;  this 
last  word  is  Hawaian,  and  is  taken  from  the  lan- 
guage of  the  people  among  whom  this  form  of 
Marriage  was  first  distinctly  observed.  It  is  con- 
stituted by  a  group  of  brothers  marrying  a  group 
of  sisters  or  of  women  not  necessarily  related ; 
that  is,  each  brother  is  the  husband  of  all  the 
women  and  each  woman  is  the  wife  of  all  the 
brothers.  Conversely  a  group  of  sisters  may 
marry  a  group  of  related  or  unrelated  husbands. 
The  same  form  of  Marriage  is  still  found  anions: 
the  Todas  of  India,  and  traces  of  it  are  said  to 
exist  elsewhere. 


134  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

It  is  evident  that  in  the  present  case  family  has 
a  tendency  to  marry  family,  the  individual  is  not 
the  unit  of  marriage.  In  a  similar  manner  wives 
have  been  supposed  to  be  common  to  all  mem- 
bers of  a  given  clan  or  tribe,  out  of  which  the 
Family  as  a  union  of  individuals  gradually 
emeroed.  But  on  the  whole  the  Consanguine 
Family  is  a  rare  phenomenon,  and  can  never 
have  been  general ;  intrusion  into  it  is  too  easy. 

One  fact,  however,  is  certain:  in  such  a  rela- 
tion paternity  becomes  doubtful,  the  child  be- 
longs with  certainty  to  its  mother  alone.  Here- 
with rises  into  view  a  new  condition,  which  has 
been  called  metrocracy  or  the  rule  of  the  mother, 
through  whom  and  not  through  the  father  kin- 
ship  was  reckoned  and  property  was  inherited. 

The  Consanguine  Marriage,  if  it  once  aro:>e, 
would  not  hold  out  long.  The  great  object  of 
the  Family  is  the  child,  and  it  is  nowthe  woman's, 
whoever  be  the  father.  In  the  sphere  of  the 
Family  she  becomes  the  absolute  possessor  of  its 
treasure,  namely  the  child,  giving  to  the  same 
her  title  and  property. 

The  preceding  terms,  Consanguine  and  Pan- 
aluan,  as  applied  to  the  Family,  are  the  coinage 
of  the  brain  of  Dr.  Lewis  Morgan,  w^hose  serv- 
ices in  the  present  field  are  of  the  highest.  The 
Evolution  of  the  Family  he  divides  into  five  suc- 
cessive stages  (see  his  Ancient  /Society^  p.  385). 
According  to  Morgan  the    Consanguine  Family 


THE  FAMILY.  135 

"  was  founded  upon  the  intermarriage  of  broth- 
ers and  sisters,  own  and  collateral  in  a  group." 
That  is,  the  primordial  Family  arose  from  the 
brothers  of  one  Family  marrying  their  own  sis- 
ters, not  severally  but  in  a  mass.  This  position 
has  been  strongly  attacked  on  all  sides,  and  is  at 
the  present  time  pretty  generally  discredited. 
Dr.  Morgan  himself  admits  that  such  a  Consan- 
guine  Family  as  he  describes  does  not  exist  any- 
where to-day  (p.  401),  in  savage  or  barbarous 
societies.  He  infers  it  from  existino;  marriage 
customs,  which,  however,  have  probably  a  dif- 
ferent explanation. 

But  the  Punaluan  Family  does  exist  and  must 
be  taken  into  the  account.  ' '  This  is  founded  upon 
the  intermarriage  of  several  sisters,  with  each 
other's  husbands,  who  are  not  necessarily  kins- 
men of  each  other."  And  the  reverse  Family 
also  is  possible,  namely  the  intermarriage  of  sev- 
eral brothers  with  each  other's  wives,  the  latter 
not  being  necessarily  related.  Thus  the  blood 
of  different  Families  intermingles  in  the  Punaluan 
Family,  though  on  one  side  it  is  still  consanguine. 
Hence  this  latter  term  may  be  applied  to  it  with- 
out ambiguity,  inasmuch  as  Morgan's  Consan- 
guine Family  has  been  substantially  eliminated 
from  science. 

A  distinction  which  has  maintained  itself  was 
first  introduced  by  Mr.  M'Lcnnan,  that  between 
endogamy  and  exogamy.     There  are   many  un- 


136  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

civilized  peoples  Avho  avoid  marrying  outside  of 
their  own  tribe;  these  are  called  endogaraous. 
On  the  other  hand  there  are  many  uncivilized 
peoples  who  avoid  marrying  inside  their  own 
tribe,  these  are  called  exogamous.  The  value  of 
this  distinction  is  strongly  questioned  by  Dr. 
Morgan  (^ Ancient  Society,  p.  511),  and  it  has 
given  rise  to  some  confusion.  Every  people  is 
doubtless  both  endoo-amous  and  exogfamous  in  a 
way;  it  has  a  limit  inside  of  which  Marriasre 
is  not  customary  (usually  that  of  blood-kin)  and 
it  has  also  a  limit  outside  of  which  Marriage  is 
not  customary  (that  of  class,  caste,  race).  Thus 
Marriage  is  located  between  an  inner  and  outer 
circle  of  prohibition ;  it  should  not  take  place 
among  the  too  near  or  the  too  remote.  This 
marriageable  territory  for  man  and  woman  is  un- 
doubtedly widening  with  civilization,  but  the  outer 
limit,  specially  of  race,  still  exists  for  even  the 
most  emanicipated. 

In  the  Consanguine  Family  (as  before  de- 
scribed) the  mother  is  emphatically  chosen  to  be 
the  maintainer  of  the  infantile  domestic  Institu- 
tion, since  Nature  points  her  out  as  mother  of  her 
child,  while  the  father  is  or  may  be  quite  un- 
known. Now  in  this  child  centers  the  grand 
purpose  of  the  Institution,  hence  rises  the 
supreme  importance,  indeed  almost  the  sole  im- 
portance of  the  mother  at  this  stage.  Authority 
passes    into    her    hands,    and   with   it   comes    a 


THE  FAMILY.  137 

new  stage  of  the  Family,  though  still  polyg- 
amous. 

2.  Polyandry  is,  in  general,  that  form  of  the 
Family  in  which  the  wife  has  several  husbands. 
It  has  been  shown  to  be  far  more  prevalent 
among  primitive  peoples  than  the  preceding  Con- 
sanguine Marriage,  through  which  many  tribes 
probably  never  passed.  But  Polyandry  seems  to 
show  so  many  traces  in  all  parts  of  the  globe, 
and  among  so  many  civilized  peoples  past  and 
present  that  it  may  well  lay  claim  to  being 
a  universal  stage  in  the  Evolution  of  the 
Family. 

Polyandry  has  two  well-marked  classes.  One 
is  called  the  Thibetan  Polyandry,  in  which  the 
woman's  husbands  are  brothers;  this  phase  of 
Polygamy  seems  to  be  derived  from  the  preceding- 
phase,  the  Consanguine  Marriage,  and  is  said  to 
be  more  common  than  the  second  kind  of  Poly- 
andry, in  which  the  husbands  are  not  related 
(called  Nair  Polyandry  ;  see  Giddings,  PniicijyJes 
of  Sociology,  p.  155). 

It  was  Bachofen,  the  Swiss  jurist,  who  first 
called  attention  to  the  fact  that  "  kinship  through 
mothers  only  "  prevailed  among  certain  peoples 
of  antiquity.  He  moreover  came  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  this  stage  preceded  the  stage  of  kinship 
through  males,  and  that  there  was  among  prim- 
itive peoples  a  supremacy  of  woman,  a  kind  of 
metrocracv  or  matriarchate.    M'Leniian  and  Mor- 


138  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

gau  entered  the  same  lield  with  extensive  research, 
followed  by  other  investigators. 

These  results  have  met  with  contradiction. 
Numerous  savage  tribes  have  been  cited  which  do 
not  trace  kinship  through  the  mother,  but  through 
the  father  (Westermark,  History  of  Marriage,  p. 
98).  Thus  it  is  probable  that  some  primitive 
peoples  have  quite  escaped  the  matriarchate,  but 
most  have  gone  through  it  apparently.  There  is 
undoubtedly  a  stage  in  Human  Society  which 
tends  to  Polyandry,  in  a  more  or  less  pronounced 
degree.  But  it  does  not  presuppose  an  antece- 
dent condition  of  sexual  promiscuity,  as  M'Len- 
nan  and  others  have  thought.  On  the  contrary, 
its  prior  form  is  rather  Monogamy,  as  we  have 
previously  endeavored  to  show.  Still  Polyandry 
and  the  matriarchate  are  found  among  all  races, 
Aryan,  Semitic,  and  Turanian,  and  in  both  hem- 
ispheres, though  some  tribes  of  these  races  seem 
to  have  quite  escaped  or  to  have  quickly  passed 
through  it. 

The  evidence,  then,  compels  us  to  accept  Poly- 
andry as  a  stage  in  the  general  Evolution  of  the 
Famih',  and  also  as  an  advance  upon  Natural 
Monogamy.  The  mother  and  child  are  not  onh' 
recognized,  but  emphasized.  This  primary  rela- 
tion of  the  Family  is  separated  and  thereby  made 
distinct  in  human  consciousness.  In  the  previous 
condition  the  stress  is  more  upon  the  sexual  rela- 
tion,   the   man   and    woman,  but   now  the  stress 


THE  FAMILY.  139 

passes  to  mother  and  child  —  a  considerable  step 
forward  in  the  development  of  the  Family. 

Still  further,  Polyandry  may  be  regarded  as  the 
discipline  of  motherhood.  The  woman  as  the 
bearer  of  the  child  has  to  have  her  race-trainino- 
to  her  task.  She  is  the  center  of  the  Family 
with  its  responsibility ;  the  mother  alone  now 
exists  in  a  domestic  sense,  the  father  beino;  a 
vanishing  element,  perchance  unknown ;  the  chil- 
dren are  hers  exclusively,  and  are  called  by  her 
name  (or  totem)  and  are  related  to  her  kindred 
alone.  Clearly  the  Mother  of  the  Race  is  here 
put  under  training ;  man  is  to  have  a  mother  be- 
fore he  has  a  father,  fatherhood  beino-  a  later  de- 
velopment  as  we  shall  see,  though  physically  first. 

Nature  points  out  emphatically  the  mother,  but 
she  (Nature)  is  inclined  to  hide  the  father  who 
has  to  be  unfolded  and  revealed  by  Institutions. 
We  can  also  see  that  the  wife  is  now  absolutely 
the  home-maker,  the  home  is  hers,  and  round  it 
the  various  husbands  may  revolve  in  the  distance 
as  a  group  of  satellites.  Property,  too,  is  hers, 
and  descends  through  her  to  her  children ;  her 
own  brothers  having  no  recognized  children  of 
their  own,  in  a  polyandrous  state  of  society, 
would  recognize  hers  as  their  kin  and  give  them 
protection  and  propert}'.  The  woman  in  Poly- 
andry would  likewise  have  her  preference,  to  a 
degree  she  might  be  able  to  select  the  father  of 
her  child —  which  tendency  is  toward  the  disso- 


140  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

lution  of  the  polyandrous relation.  Naturally  she 
would  choose  the  one  she  admires —  the  strong, 
the  heroic,  the  better  man  among  her  husbands. 
Thus  the  monogamous  instinct  makes  itself  valid 
against  Polyandry.  And  the  man  of  power 
would  put  in  some  heavy  strokes  for  sole  pos- 
session of  the  woman,  being  impelled  by  two  of 
those  primitive  passions  of  the  human  soul,  love 
and  jealousy,  and  possibly  by  some  others,  such 
as  avarice. 

Thus  Polyandry  has  in  it  decided  elements  of 
dissolution,  but  while  it  lasts  it  gives  to  the 
mother  greater  power  tlian  she  has  ever  had  in 
any  state  of  society  since.  It  has  been  called 
Metrocracy  or  the  Government  of  the  Mother, 
all  other  forms  of  Government  afterwards  being 
Androcracies  or  Governments  of  Men,  such  as 
democracy,  aristocracy,  monarchy,  etc.  But 
specially  we  may  deem  Polyandry,  in  the  Evolu- 
tion of  the  Family,  as  the  grand  training  of  the 
Mother  to  the  love  and  care  of  her  child,  upon 
whom  her  life  is  centered  by  being  made  hus- 
bandless,  or,  what  is  the  next  thing  to  it,  many- 
husbanded. 

Already  we  have  indicated  the  seeds  of  disso- 
lution in  Polyandry.  Both  love  and  jealousy  will 
assail  it  from  both  sides,  male  and  female.  Then 
heredity  will  play  in.  The  love  of  the  mother 
for  her  offspring,  concentrated  and  intensified  by 
Polyandry,    must    pass    to  her  son,   who  in  the 


THE  FAMILY.  Ul 

course  of  the  evolutionary  cycle  will  also  feel  the 
mother's  intense  love  of  the  child.  Slowly  the 
man,  the  father,  will  transform  the  Family  that 
he  too  may  have  offspring  as  well  as  the  mother, 
and  may  know  it  as  his  own.  Indeed  he  will  now 
evolve  an  institution  which  will  make  him 
reasonably  certain  of  his  paternity.  Nature,  as 
already  said,  leaves  no  doubt  as  to  the  mother, 
but  she  has  not  been  so  gracious  to  the  father, 
who  has,  accordingly,  to  help  himself  out  by  a 
new  social  arrangement. 

3.  This  is  Polygyny,  that  form  of  the  Family 
in  which  the  man  has  two  or  more  wives.  The 
center  now  shifts  from  the  female  to  the  male 
who  is  the  domestic  unit ;  the  husband  is  one,  the 
wives  are  many.  Polygyny  is  a  social  stage  which 
is,  on  the  whole,  more  advanced  than  Polyan- 
dry, and  far  more  common.  Its  range  is  very 
great,  it  reaches  down  to  the  animal,  yet  is  found 
among  many  civilized  nations.  Indeed  the  most 
extended  of  all  world-civilizations  is  the  Oriental, 
and  it  is  essentially  poly gy nous. 

Again  we  must  see  in  this  form  of  society  a 
great  training  of  humanity  unto  the  end  of  the 
Family.  Very  manifestly  the  father  is  wheeled 
into  line  and  is  made  to  take  up  his  domestic  bur- 
den. For  it  is  not  mere  sensuality  which  pro- 
duces Polygyny,  the  sexual  passion  could  be 
gratified  at  an  outlay  of  much  less  trouble  and 
expense.     It  is  the  man's  love  of  offspring,  his 


142  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

desire  of  fatherhood,  which  he  can  have  inherited 
from  a  long  line  of  maternal  ancestors.  He  be- 
comes the  head  of  the  Family,  in  a  way  the  head 
of  several  Families.  He  takes  several  wives  and 
puts  them  under  stringent  control  in  order  to  safe- 
guard his  paternit}-. 

Thus  the  Patriarchate  rises  into  view,  furnish- 
ing a  decided  contrast  to  the  Matriarchate,  the 
one  being  based  on  Polygyny,  the  other  on  Poly- 
andry. The  Patriarchal  Family  is  familiar  to  us 
from  the  Hebrew  Bible,  but  we  have  had  no 
Matriarchal  Literature  till  the  present  genera- 
tion. 

In  Polyg3aiy  the  woman  is  put  under  a  new 
training  for  the  Family.  She  is  therein  to  be 
disciplined  out  of  her  polyandrous  consciousness 
into  fidelity  to  one  man.  Polygj-ny  springs  from 
the  husband's  distrust  of  the  wife,  and  so  he 
builds  an  institution,  which  puts  her  into  a 
harem,  guards  her  with  eunuchs,  and  makes  her 
veil  her  face  when  she  goes  forth  into  the  world 
outside  of  her  domestic  Avails.  A  bitter  disci- 
pline it  seems  to  us,  still  we  may  find  the  ground 
of  its  iustification.  The  father  is  goino-  to  secure 
fatherhood  at  all  hazards  against  the  hitherto 
polyandrous  nature  of  the  woman.  Meanwhile 
she  through  harsh  servitude  is  moving  toward 
freedom,  she  is  getting  ready  for  Monogamy,  of 
which  she  Avill  become  the  guardian,  exacting 
from  the  man  the  same  fidelity  toward  her  which 


THE  FAMILY.  143 

she  gives  to  him,  and  whicii  he  injustice  must 
grant. 

In  Polygjnj  ,  the  father  having  different  sets  of 
children  and  wives  has  a  training  unto  justice, 
since  he  must  settle  their  disputes,  their  conflict- 
ing claims.  Indeed,  he  must  orsanize  them  into 
a  kind  of  State,  the  patriarchal  State,  and  bring 
them  all  under  impartial  judgment  and  the  law. 
Though  he  be  the  father,  he  must  also  be  the 
judge  and  the  ruler.  His  power  is  absolute,  and 
he  may  become  the  tyrant,  still  he  has  some  re- 
straint in  affection  and  perchance  in  his  sense  of 
justice.  The  childrennow  take  the  father's  name, 
and  the  propertj^  is  his  and  descends  through  him 
to  his  heirs.  The  Patriarchate  has  in  it  the  train- 
ing of  the  father  into  the  ruler,  and  thus  forms 
one  line  of  transition  from  Family  to  State. 

Moreover  Polygyny  is  connected  in  the  Ori- 
ental mind  with  splendor,  many  wives  indicate 
much  power  and  wealth.  The  poor  cannot  be 
polygynous  even  in  polygynous  countries.  This 
makes  a  social  distinction  which  shows  in  time 
a  disintegrating  power. 

Polygyny  has  shown  itself  to  be  a  far  stronger 
and  more  persistent  element  in  the  Evolution  of 
the  Family  than  Polyandry ;  still  it  too  dissolves 
and  passes  into  a  higher  stage.  The  father  must 
transmit  his  qualities  to  his  daughter  as  well  as 
to  his  son ;  the  woman,  born  in  Polygyny,  must 
finally    inherit  enough  of  his  independence  and 


144  ^SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

love  of  rule  to  protest  against  her  chains.  She 
will  also  feel  that  the  very  purpose  of  the  insti- 
tution has  reached  its  end  when  she  is  conscious 
of  her  womanly  fidelity.  And  the  man,  growing 
in  the  consciousness  of  justice,  must  recognize 
the  claim. 

Moreover  a  w^hole  people  cannot  be  polygynous, 
nature  forbids ;  only  a  small  fraction  of  the  total 
population  have  or  can  have  more  than  one  wafe. 
Thus  Polygyny  can  never  be  compulsor}',  a  law 
of  the  nation ;  at  most  it  is  permissive  and  for 
the  few.  It  belongs  to  the  Oriental  despotism,  or 
rather  to  the  theocracy,  in  which  God's  chosen 
favorites  have  the  divine  privilege  of  many  wives. 

In  the  Evolution  of  the  Family,  Polygyny 
passes  into  Monogamy,  which  must  rest  on  trust 
and  love.  The  wife  is  faithful  to  the  one,  not 
through  force  but  in  freedom,  and  shows  a  char- 
acter in  the  West  quite  unknown  in  the  Orient. 
It  has  been  often  remarked  that  the  women  of 
the  Hebrew  Bible  are  far  from  being  an  ideal  set, 
beoinnino-  with  Mother  Eve.  It  looks  as  if  she 
were  in  continual  sullen  protest  against  her  insti- 
tutional world,  which  brought  out  the  devil  in 
her  nature.  Woman,  according  to  the  Hebrew 
story,  is  the  cause  of  man's  fall  and  Avickedness. 
There  is  a  tendency  in  Oriental  literature  and  folk- 
lore, and  hence  in  Oriental  consciousness  to  re- 
gard the  feminine  as  the  incarnation  of  the  Satan- 
ic.    The  Eternal-womanly  (Das  Ewig-weibliche) 


THE  FAMILY.  146 

belongs  to  the  Occident,  certainly  not  to  Judea 
or  the  Orient.  It  starts  distinctly  with  Homer. 
Polygyny  could  not  well  make  a  good  woman ;  we 
may  almost  affirm  that  it  stands  to  her  credit  that 
in  such  a  condition  she  showed  her  negative  na- 
ture to  such  a  degree  that  the  Oriental  man  has 
given  her  a  bad  name. 

The  advance  out  of  Polygyny  is  a  great  step  for 
the  man,  but  a  greater  one  for  the  woman.  Rel- 
atively at  least  she  has  won  freedom  and  equal- 
ity—  freedom  from  suspicious  surveillance,  and 
equality  in  selfhood ;  for  her  one  undivided  Self 
she  receives  one  undivided  Self  in  return.  This 
brings  us  to  the  third  great  stage  in  the  Evolution 
of  the  Family. 

III.  Institutional  Monogamy.  Already  we 
have  noticed  an  undercurrent  of  Monogamy  both 
in  Polyandry  and  Polygyny,  that  is,  permitted 
Monogamy.  But  now  it  is  to  become  compul- 
sory, enforced  by  Law  and  Institution,  as  well  as 
sanctioned  by  Morality.  Monogamy  is  for  all, 
universal,  or  can  be  made  so;  it  is  the  blessing 
which  the  whole  people,  high  and  low,  rich  and 
poor,  king  and  subject,  may  share  and  finally  must 
share,  if  they  enter  the  Family  at  all.  The 
ruler,  whatever  be  his  grandeur,  must  be  monog- 
amous too.  Thus  it  is  an  advance  in  equality, 
in  democracy,  if  you  please;  certainly  a  phase  of 
individual  freedom  versus  absolutism.  Very 
naturally  Institutional  Monogamy  was  definitively 

10 


146  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

born  and  vindicated  in  Greece,  being  there  ele- 
vated into  a  portion  of  the  spiritual  heritage  of 
the  race. 

"VVe  may  repeat  in  this  connection  that  neither 
Polyandry  nor  Polygyny  can  be  raade  into  a  uni- 
versal principle  for  a  nation,  and  hence  can  never 
be  enacted  into  a  law,  which  is  binding  on  all. 
Just  the  opposite  is  Monogamy,  which  becomes 
universal  of  its  own  inherent  power,  being  cap- 
able of  legalit}'.  Thus  we  reach  the  stage  which 
may  be  called  Institutional  Monogamy,  since  it  is 
the  law  both  statutory  and  moral.  The  first 
stage,  that  of  Natural  Monogamy,  is  the  immedi- 
ate monogamic  impulse  of  Nature;  this  remains, 
but  no  longer  as  rude  physical  desire,  being  now 
mediated  throuo:h  the  Institution. 

A  great  period  in  the  history  of  man  it  was 
when  Monogamj'  permanently  arose  and  became 
institutional.  Not  in  a  day  w^as  the  transition 
accomplished,  still  the  point  in  time  and  place  can 
be  distinctly  marked.  Europe  begins  Avith  Insti- 
tutional Monogamy,  which  is  more  than  any  other 
fact  the  salient  characteristic  of  Occidental  civ- 
ilization. The  Family  changes  wholly  when  it 
passes  out  of  Polygamy  into  Monogamy;  the 
woman,  the  child,  the  father,  are  transformed  by 
the  new  domestic  Institution,  the  basis  of  all 
other  Institutions.  The  great  change  can  be 
summed  up  in  the  statement  that  man  and  woman 
too  can  now  become  free,  institutionallv  free. 


THE  FAMILY.  147 

It  is«  the  enduring  glory  of  the  old  Greek  world 
that  it  established,  proclaimed,  defended,  and 
fought  for  Monogamy,  and  thus  made  the  spirit- 
ual passage  out  of  polygamous  Asia  into  mono- 
gamous Europe.  Greece  was  born  through  the 
Trojan  War  which  was  waged  for  the  restoration 
of  Helen,  the  one  wife,  to  her  husband,  when  she 
had  been  stolen  by  an  Oriental  prince.  The  W'hole 
Iliad  rests  uponthe  conception  of  the  monogamous 
Family,  which  has  been  violated  by  Troy,  but  is 
asserted  by  all  Hellas  with  its  army  and  ten  years' 
war  against  the  Trojan  city,  which  will  not  give 
back  the  wife  on  demand  of  the  Greeks.  Priam, 
ruler  of  Troy,  has  a  dubious,  if  not  a  polygamous, 
household,  though  Hector  and  Andromache  are 
supremely  monogamous.  But  Hector  hates  the 
deed  of  Paris,  the  seducer,  advises  the  restoration 
of  Helen,  and  thinks  his  country  wrong,  though  he 
fights  in  its  defense  when  it  is  assailed.  Thus  the 
great  poem  which  opens  the  Occident  has  as  its 
underlying  institutional  theme  the  monogamous 
Family,  showing  the  violation  thereof  and  the 
punishment  of  that  violation.  The  Iliad  sings 
the  prelude  of  European  civilization,  attuning 
itself  to  the  keynote  which  throbs  in  the  tale  of 
Helen,  whose  theme  is  the  restoration  of  the  one 
wife  to  the  one  husband. 

When  we  look  at  the  Odyssey,  we  find  the  same 
fact  intensified.  First  of  all  is  the  fidelity  of  the 
wife  Penelope,  who  is  put  to  the  hardest  trial 


148  SOCIAL  lySTITUTIONS. 

possible,  but  never  flinches  in  her  devotion  to  her 
husband.  Here  the  monogamous  tie  is  celebrated 
in  the  woman  beyond  any  example  in  literature. 
Of  the  same  character  is  Arete  who  is  the 
womanly  soul  of  that  ideal  Phaeacian  world, 
hardly  yet  realized  in  these  days.  Nor  has  the 
old  poet  spared  the  guilty  wife  —  witness  the  fate 
of  faithless  Clytemnestra. 

It  may  be  said,  therefore,  that  Homer  has 
written  the  Bible  of  Monogamy  for  the  Occi- 
dent. In  this  regard  he  has  been  supremely  the 
educator  of  the  European  consciousness.  He 
first  assigned  to  the  woman  her  true  position  in 
the  Family,  and  flashed  the  outlines  of  her  char- 
acter upon  the  future,  so  that  she  is  still  fulfilling 
his  prophecy.  Incalculable  has  been  his  influ- 
ence in  moulding  the  domestic  Institution  of  the 
Occident,  and  along  with  it  necessarily  other  In- 
stitutions. "We  go  back  to  the  old  Greek  bard, 
and,  after  communing  with  his  shapes,  we  feel 
often  compelled  to  say :  Our  age  has  not  yet 
altogether  overtaken  Homer. 

As  the  Hebrews  wrote  the  Bible  of  Monothe- 
ism for  the  Occident,  so  Homer  wrote  the  Bible 
of  Monogamy  for  the  Occident.  We  are,  indeed, 
the  heirs  of  both,  yet  we  have  rejected  a  part  of 
both  inheritances.  The  Polygamy  of  the  Hebrew 
we  cannot  accept,  nor  can  we  accept  the  Polythe- 
ism of  Homer.  The  religious  Bible  belongs  to 
the    Semite,    the    secular  Bible    belongs  to    the 


THE  FAMILY.  149 

Greek;  both  are  fountain-heads  of  our  institu- 
tional world,  which  has  Just  these  two  main 
streams,  secular  and  religious.  The  Greek  had 
many  Gods,  but  insisted  upon  having  one  wife 
(as  in  the  story  of  Helen)  ;  the  Hebrews  on  the 
contrary  had  many  wives  (as  in  the  case  of 
Solomon)  but  insisted  upon  having  the  one  God. 
Christendom  has  accepted  the  unity  in  both  in- 
stances and  rejected  the  multiplicity.  Homer, 
therefore,  has  gone  in  advance  and  set  up  for 
future  civilization  the  ideal  of  Institutional  Mo- 
nogamy. We  may  next  briefly  note  how  this 
ideal  has  been  realized  in  the  historic  fact,  by 
taking  a  glance  at  the  chief  peoples  of  Europe 
since  Homer's  time  in  regard  to  the  present 
matter. 

1 .  If  Homer  be  assigned  to  the  legendary  age 
of  Greece,  it  will  have  to  be  confessed  that  the 
historic  age  of  that  country  fell  behind  its  poet's 
ideal.  At  Athens  there  was  a  strict  Monogamy 
by  law  and  custom ;  but  the  wife  was  secluded  in 
the  home,  attending  to  the  round  of  domestic 
duties,  while  the  husband  often  indulged  in  a 
good  deal  of  laxity  in  his  sexual  relations.  The 
prominence  of  the  Homeric  woman  as  the  up- 
holder of  the  Family  quite  vanishes  in  later 
Greek  life,  though  Attic  tragedy  sometimes  re- 
called her  former  independence,  as  in  the  Anti- 
gone of  Sophocles.  Plato  in  his  Repuhlic  pro- 
posed to  reconstruct  entirely  the  position  of  the 


150  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Athenian  woman  of  his  age,  giving  her  equal 
opportunities  and  rights  with  the  man.  But  he 
destroys  the  Family,  and  shows  himself  the  foe 
of  Monogamy  —  which  fact  may  be  deemed  one 
ground  of  his  opposition  to  Homer,  though  he 
assigns  another.  Here  the  poet  is  far  greater 
than  the  philosopher. 

In  Eonie  also  the  monogamous  relation  pre- 
vailed, and  the  Roman  wife,  though  completely 
subject  to  her  husband,  had  a  position  of  honor 
and  authority.  The  Roman  Family,  however, 
went  to  pieces  with  the  dissolution  of  the  Repub- 
lic, and  from  the  same  general  cause. 

2.  Passing  out  of  Heathendom  into  Christen- 
dom we  observe  a  dual  position  of  the  Family,  a 
side  of  elevation  and  a  side  of  degradation,  a 
purification  of  it  on  the  one  hand  and  a  dispar- 
agement of  it  on  the  other.  In  the  New  Testa- 
ment  very  meager  are  the  statements  of  Christ 
in  reference  to  the  domestic  Institution,  though 
he  evidently  regarded  it  as  monogamous,  and  as 
a  tie  not  to  be  dissolved  except  for  one  cause, 
infidelity  on  the  part  of  husband  or  Avife.  But 
Paul  has  a  low  opinion  of  woman,  and  evidently 
regards  marriage  as  a  necessary  evil.  He  still 
keeps  the  degraded  Hebrew  notion  Avhich 
springs  from  Polygamy.  Some  of  his  rea- 
sons why  marriage  is  to  be  tolerated  can 
only  be  pronounced  immoral.  Christ  and  the 
apostles  generally  held  aloof  from   the  domestic 


THE  FAMILY.  151 

Institution,  and  tlieir  example  went  over  into 
the  Church. 

In  early  and  medieval  Christianity  celibacy 
began  its  domination,  which  was  carried  to  such 
an  extent  that  holiness  was  conceived  to  be  incon- 
sistent with  the  domestic  Institution.  There  is 
no  doubt  that  religion  took  a  strongl}^  antago- 
nistic attitude  to  the  Family ;  the  entire  hierarch- 
ical organization  of  the  Church  became  celibate. 
It  is  true  that  the  clergy  placed  upon  marriage 
certain  restrictions  which  tended  to  Monogamy 
as  well  as  to  the  permanence  and  purity  of  the 
married  relation ;  but  it  was  all  done  from  the 
outside  with  a  kind  of  toleration  and  condescen- 
sion on  the  part  of  the  priesthood,  who  did  not 
and  could  not  set  the  example  to  their  flock  in 
their  lives.  In  fact  the  confession  nmst  be  made 
that  marriage  in  early  heathen  Greece  and  Rome 
was  a  more  profoundly  religious  act  than  in  the 
medieval  Christian  world.  Logically  the  doc- 
trine of  celibacy  means  the  extinction  of  the 
human  race  in  proportion  to  its  holiness ;  to 
make  man  good  he  must  be  destroyed. 

Against  this  negative  tendency  of  the  religious 
Institution  rose  a  mighty  reaction  in  course  of 
centuries.  In  order  to  save  himself  man  returns 
to  antiquity  and  revives  its  secular  Institutions 
with  its  culture  and  its  freedom.  This  brings  us 
to  the  next  stage. 

3.  The  Reformation  was  specially  a  new  birth 


152  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

of  the  Family,  for  which  it  did  more  than  for 
any  other  Institution.  With  this  renascence  of 
the  Family  came  a  renascence  of  humanity,  a 
fresh  humanization  of  the  world.  Celibacy  in 
particular  was  cast  off  as  hostile  to  man;  the 
Family  was  lifted  out  of  its  antagonism  to  the 
holy  life,  and  through  it  religion  was  made  to 
stream  over  into  the  secular  world  and  assist  in 
its  progress  toward  freedom. 

The  great  poet  of  this  renascence  is  Shakes- 
peare, who  has  given  expression  to  it  more  com- 
pletely and  more  beautifully  than  any  other 
writer  or  artist.  In  his  portrayal  of  the  charac- 
ter of  woman  and  her  devotion  to  the  domestic 
Institution,  he  recalls  his  eldest  poetic  brother, 
ancient  Homer.  In  Shakespeare's  comedies,  mar- 
riage is  the  grand  end  of  Love,  which  thus  finds 
its  fruition  in  the  domestic  Institution.  In  one 
of  his  dramas,  Measure  for  Measure,  he  brings 
directly  before  us  the  above-mentioned  institu- 
tional element  of  the  Reformation ;  a  monk  and 
a  nun  are  introduced,  who,  however,  have  to 
return  to  the  secular  life  from  which  they  have 
fled,  in  order  to  purify  it  and  impart  to  it  their 
virtue.  The  outcome  of  the  play  is  that  they 
marry  each  other,  wherein  monastic  celibacy  is 
shown  passing  over  into  the  domestic  Institution, 
in  which  is  to  be  found  the  new  holy  life. 

The  preceding  view  of  the  Family  belongs 
chiefly  to  Northern  or  Teutonic  Europe,  in  which 


THE  FAMILY.  158 

the  Reformation  prevailed.  In  Southern  or  Latin 
Europe  the  aspect  of  the  domestic  Institution  is 
somewhat  different  and  it  is  certainly  weaker, 
less  prolific,  less  influential.  Particularly  in 
France  the  Family  seems  to  be  losing  its  repro- 
ductive power,  whatever  be  the  cause. 

The  future  development  of  the  Family  will 
probably  continue  on  the  lines  of  Institutional 
Monogamy,  which  insists  primarily  upon  the  re- 
lation of  one  man  and  one  woman,  protecting 
and  defending  the  same  by  law.  New  problems 
are  thrusting  themselves  upon  the  domestic  In- 
stitution, particularly  from  the  side  of  the 
woman,  whose  position  in  a  number  of  important 
respects  is  changing  in  the  modern  era.  Woman, 
especially  in  America,  is  now  being  educated  on 
a  par  with  men ;  the  social  vocations  are  thrown 
open  to  her  on  every  side.  Still  her  chief  voca- 
tion must  remain  that  of  being  the  mother  of 
mankind.  This  limit  is  draw^n  so  firmly  upon 
her  that  there  is  no  escape.  The  Family  must 
continue  supremely  her  Institution,  and  in  it  she 
must  find  her  true  freedom.  Of  course  there 
will  be  exceptions,  the  ups  and  downs  of  life  may 
turn  her  away  from  marriage,  and  she  must  be 
allowed  to  choose  freely  whether  she  will  or  not 
take  upon  herself  her  sex's  main  burden.  The 
complete  institutional  freedom  of  the  Family 
demands  that  her  Free  Will  must  will  the  repro- 
duction of  the  Free- Will,  which  has  been  stated 


154  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

to  be  the  end  and  purpose  of  the  domestic  Insti- 
tution. 

Such  is  a  brief  statement  of  Institutional 
Monogamy,  as  it  has  unfolded  itself  in  European 
civilization.  Its  first  prophetic  note  was  sung  by 
ancient  Homer,  who  has  set  forth  the  monog- 
amous ideal  for  all  succeeding  ages,  particuhirly 
through  his  female  characters.  With  him  our 
literature  begins,  for  without  the  love,  of  man  and 
woman  there  is  no  Occidental  literature,  at  least 
not  in  any  universal  sense.  Through  the  Greek 
and  Eoman,  through  the  early  Christian  and 
Medieval  periods,  Monogamy  has  remained  the 
iftstitutional  basis  of  the  Family,  till  it  has  at- 
tained its  present  development.  Thus  we  have 
again  reached  our  starting-point,  the  positive 
Family. 

Nor  must  we  forget  that  the  human  Family, 
ere  it  attained  its  monogamous  stage,  went 
through  a  long  training  in  other  forms  of  the 
domestic  relation.  These  have  been  cursorily 
treated  in  the  preceding  Evolution  of  the  Family, 
whose  manifold  forms  we  need  not  here  repeat- 
Such  is  the  total  process  of  the  domestic  Insti- 
tution. 

Some  Observations  on  tlie  Family.  We  have 
now  set  forth  the  three  grand  stages  of  the  Fam- 
ily  —  Positive,  Negative,  and  Evolutionary  — 
which  are  always  existent  in  ever}'  people,  and 
are  always  in  a  process  with  one  another,  form- 


THE  FAMILY.  155 

ing  the  total  movement  of  the  domestic  Institu- 
tion. Now  as  the  Family  is  the  source  of  all 
Institutions,  so  this  movement  will  be  found  in 
them  all,  and  orderinof  them  accordingr  to  its 
fundamental  stages.  The  Family  transmits  its 
psychical  organization  also  to  its  institutional 
progeny. 

1.  From  the  preceding  exposition  we  see  that 
the  development  of  Institutional  Monogamy  has 
taken  place  chiefly  in  the  Aryan  race.  Yet  this 
characteristic  is  not  racial,  for  many  Asiatic- 
Aryans  are  polygamous.  Nor  have  all  European 
Aryans  been  monogamous ;  the  ancient  Germans, 
Slavs,  Scandinavians  practiced  polygyny.  Not 
till  the  Aryan  race  had  been  passed  through  the 
Greco-Roman  alembic,  was  Monogamy  secured  to 
civilization.  Even  since  then,  however,  many 
relapses  have  taken  place.  Christianity  has  not 
infrequently  tolerated  polygyny;  St.  Augustine 
has  expressly  said  that  he  did  not  condemn  it, 
and  Luther  allowed  Philip  of  Hessen  to  marry 
two  women,  "  since  Christ  is  silent  on  the  subject 
of  polygyny."  The  Merovingian  kings  prac- 
ticed it,  and  royalty  has  hardly  abandoned  a  cer- 
tain form  of  it  to-day.  After  the  terrible  de- 
struction of  males  during  the  Thirty  Years'  War 
some  German  states  legally  sanctioned  bigamy 
(see  "NVestermark,  Huradn  Marriage,  p.  434), 
which  was  a  heathenish  Teutonic  relapse  to  the 
Germans    of   Tacitus.     Institutional  Monogamy 


156  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

is,  therefore,  not  Aryan,  not  European,  not 
even  Christian  originally,  but  belongs  to  Greco- 
Roman  antiquity,  which  made  it  the  foundation 
stone  of  all  future  civilization  of  the  best  form. 
This  is  not  saying  that  both  Greeks  and  Romans 
did  not  often  violate  its  principle. 

2.  The  various  stages  of  relapse  in  the  Per- 
verted Family  (see  third  phase  of  the  Negative 
Family)  are  reversions  from  former  stages  of  the 
Evolution  of  the  Family,  wherein  we  note  that 
what  was  once  progress  becomes  later  retro- 
gression, and  unethical  besides.  The  woman, 
who,  in  a  monogamous  society,  lapses  to  poly- 
andry, is  unethical;  the  same  is  true  of  the  man 
who,  in  a  monogamous  society,  goes  back  to 
polygyny.  Thus  we  observe  that  Ethics  has 
ultimately  an  institutional  origin,  and  the  moral 
conscience  is  really  a  product  and  growth  of  the 
development  of  Institutions,  which  becomes  an 
organic  element  of  every  normal  Self.  The  su- 
preme virtue  of  man  is,  accordingly,  what  may 
be  called  institutional  virtue,  that  virtue  whose 
habit  is  to  will  institutional  Will  in  its  full 
actuality. 

3.  There  is  a  dispute  among  naturalists  as  to 
whether  the  higher  Quudrumana  are  social, 
whether  they  live  in  gangs  or  in  pairs,  or  even 
lead  solitary  lives  for 'the  most  part.  The  Go- 
rilla is  declared  to  be  not  gregarious,  and  also 
the  Chimpanzee,  by  competent  observers.     The 


THE. FAMILY.  157 

Ourang-outang  is  well-known  for  his  solitary 
habits.  It  has  been,  accordingly,  supposed  that 
our  fruit-eating,  half -human  ancestor  must  have 
had  a  good  deal  of  the  same  character.  In  fact 
many  of  the  primitive  sorts  of  mankind  show 
to-day  a  total  lack  of  association  beyond  the 
Family;  no  tribe,  no  communal  life,  or  only  the 
faintest  traces  thereof  can  be  found. 

It  may,  therefore,  be  said  that  it  is  the  Family 
which  trains  man  towards  and  into  Society. 
He  must  first  be  domesticated  ere  he  can  be 
socialized.  Already  we  have  noted  the  part 
which  domestication  plays  in  every  Family  whose 
origin  dates  from  to-day  in  civilization ;  every 
man  and  woman  after  being  married  have  to  go 
through  the  process  of  being  domesticated.  But 
the  race  also  has  gone  through  just  that  process 
too,  starting  (let  us  suppose)  with  some  frugiv- 
orous  anthropoid  ape  roaming  the  primeval 
woods  in  solitary  selfishness,  gathering  and  eat- 
ing nuts  and  berries  and  wild  fruits.  Sorely 
does  such  a  being  need  domestication,  and  he 
gets  it  through  untold  seons  of  discipline,  till  he 
at  last  becomes  not  only  domestic,  but  also  social. 
In  a  certain  degree  every  married  pair  has  to  pass 
through  afresh  this  training  of  the  race. 

4.  There  is  a  great  people,  reputed  to  be  nearly 
one-third  of  the  human  species,  also  highly  civ- 
ilized in  many  respects,  which  has  never  fully 
unfolded  beyond  the  Family  into  the  other  secu- 


IbS  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

lar  Institutions.  The  Chinese  have  a  vast  State, 
but  it  is  theoretically,  and,  as  far  as  possible, 
practically  one  Family,  at  whose  head  stands  the 
father,  the  emperor,  who  is  absolute,  and  who 
regards  the  people  as  his  children  in  tutelage. 
The  all-penetrating  virtue  which  is  inculcated  by 
education  in  Confucius  and  practiced  universally 
is  domestic  affection  (pie fas),  which  undoubtedly 
has  its  place  everywhere  and  has  its  beautiful 
side  always,  but  which  in  China  quite  supplants 
other  virtues  and  stifles  free  development,  in  fact 
collides  deeply  with  Free-Will.  The  son,  even 
when  married,  is  under  his  father,  and  his  father 
under  the  grandfather,  and  the  latter,  if  alive,  is 
under  his  dead  ancestors.  The  Family  is  doubt- 
less the  primal  institutional  unit,  the  germinal 
cell  out  of  which  all  Institutions  have  unfolded, 
but  China  seems  to  have  taken  this  unit  and 
crystallized  it  into  one  enormous  homogeneous 
mass  of  cells  with  little  or  no  inner  development 
into  other  forms  of  institutional  life.  This  is  the 
peculiarity  of  Chinese  civilization  as  distinct  from 
Aryan. 

Still  not  without  opposition  has  all  this  taken 
place  even  in  China.  Confucius  and  Mencius  in- 
culcate the  right  of  revolution  along  with  their 
doctrine  of  filial  piety ;  the  parent  must  do  his 
duty,  that  is,  must  keep  his  son  under,  else 
the  latter  will  rebel.  There  was  once  a  Chinese 
emperor   who    sought   to  destroy  all  books,  all 


TEE  FAMILY.  169 

records  of  the  past,  and  have  China  begin  over 
again,  but  he  did  not  succeed. 

5.  In  Marriage,  if  the  union  be  as  complete  as 
it  ought  to  be,  it  must  cement  the  twain  out- 
wardly and  inwardly  in  a  triple  fashion.  First 
there  is  the  unity  of  passion,  the  physical  element. 
Secondly,  there  is  the  unity  of  emotion,  in  which 
the  two  souls  are  one  —  love.  Thirdly,  there  is  • 
the  unity  of  intellect,  in  which  Thought  itself  gets 
married  and  gives  up  its  isolation.  Not  only  the 
body  but  also  the  heart,  not  only  the  heart  but 
also  the  head  is  to  share  in  the  domestic  Institu- 
tion, when  the  Marriage  is  complete. 

The  absence  of  any  one  of  these  three  elements 
makes  the  union  less  strong.  Physically  a  good 
basis  for  Marriage  is  not  given  if  the  man  or 
woman  be  decrepit,  deformed,  or  afflicted  wdth 
the  taint  of  inherited  disease.  The  vast  mass  of 
marriages  must  rest  mainly  upon  the  second 
element,  love,  which  is  the  emotional  unity,  and 
which  ought  to  be  permanent,  yet  has  to  be  re- 
nouncible,  as  experience  shows.  But  in  the 
modern  world  and  specially  in  the  Occident,  the 
third  element  is  rising  into  prominence,  chiefly 
because  of  the  higher  education  of  the  woman, 
who  is  inclined  to  look  "with  favor  upon  the  man 
that  can  satisfy  her  head  as  well  as  her  heart,  she 
insisting  that  her  whole  Self  must  get  married 
and  not  a  part  of  herself.  The  cultured  woman 
must  be  wedded  in  her  culture,  otherwise  there 


160  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

is  a  gfiD  in  the  marriage,  which  is  apt  to  grow 
wider  with  the  years.  Sometimes  the  man,  but 
of  tener  the  woman  after  marriage  develops  through 
study  and  reading  into  a  new  stage  of  culture 
which  shakes  or  even  breaks  the  old  tie. 

We  have  called  this  third  stage  of  marriage  a 
modern  one,  yet  it  occurs  in  isolated  cases  even 
in  antiquity.  Plutarch  has  told  us  of  Portia,  wife 
of  Brutus,  who  shared  with  her  husband  the 
study  of  philosophy,  and  insisted  upon  sharing 
the  secrets  of  his  brain  when  he  was  enojao-ed  in 
the  conspiracy  against  Cagsar.  Shakespeare 
has  picked  up  this  trait  of  Portia  in  his  drama 
of  Julius  Ccesar,  and  set  it  forth  with  a  daring 
prominence,  and  with  a  prophetic  outlook  upon 
the  coming  woman.  She  insists  upon  knowing 
her  husband's  thoughts,  and  declares,  if  she  is 
excluded  from  them,  if  she  is  not  married  to  his 
ntellect  also,  "  Portia  is  Brutus'  harlot,  not  his 
wife."  A  stunning  sentence,  but  having  many  a 
recent  counterpart  both  in  word  and  deed. 

6.  The  woman  must  also  be  free  in  the  Family, 
institutionally  free ;  she  must  will  Free-AVill  in 
the  reproduction  of  the  Person,  and  this  must  not 
be  forced  upon  her,  nor  is  she  to  obey  blindly 
sexual  instinct.  In  other  words  she  must  will 
motherhood  in  order  to  be  free  in  her  Institution, 
she  must  consciously  will  its  end,  which  is  the 
existence  of  a  new  Free-Will  in  the  world.  Thus 
the  Family  secures  her  end,  her  "Will,  making  it 


THE  FAMILY.  161 

actual.  The  woman  in  her  supreme  function 
must  be  a  Free-Will  producing  Free-Will;  her 
freedom  is  what  creates  freedom  in  her  descend- 
ants ;  an  enslaved  woman  cannot  well  give  birth 
to  free  citizens.  The  mothers  of  the  people, 
willino^  the  existence  of  Free-Will  in  and  through 
the  domestic  Institution  transmit  their  character 
to  their  sons  and  bring  forth  a  nation  of  freemen. 
Of  course  the  father  is  also  to  have  a  hand  in 
this  business. 

7.  In  polygamous  society  we  have  seen  the 
man  carefully  secluding  the  woman  and  compel- 
ling her  fidelity  by  many  an  external  precaution. 
It  was  the  hard  training  of  the  woman  out  of  the 
preceding  stage  of  Polyandry,  and  her  prepara- 
tion for  Monogamy.  Nature  secures  motherhood? 
but  Institutions  have  to  secure  fatherhood.  Here 
lies  the  reason  why  monogamous  society  still 
punishes  the  woman's  infidelity  more  severely 
than  the  man's.  She  is  the  guardian  of  the 
man's  blood,  of  the  true  descent  from  him, 
whereas  he  is  not  the  guardian  of  her  blood,  of 
her  lineage.  The  wife  can  give  to  the  husband 
his  own  son,  or  another  man's  son,  if  she  is 
faithless  ;  but  he  can  never  impose  on  her  another 
woman's  child,  whatever  be  his  infidelity.  In 
true  Monogamy,  of  course,  the  husband  should 
be  as  faithful  as  the  wife. 

8.  The  Renascence  was  the  new  birth  of  many 
things,  among  others  of  the  Family,  which  then 

11^ 


Ifi3  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

rose  out  of  its  somewhat  discredited  medieval 
position.  The  result  was  that  the  Family  began 
building  a  new  Home,  a  worthy  temple  for  its 
indwelling  spirit;  hence  domestic  Architecture 
sprang  into  existence.  The  palaces  of  the  great 
Italian  Families  in  Florence,  Eome  and  Venice 
have  made  an  epoch  in  the  artistic  construction 
of  the  private  residence  which  has  continued  its 
influence  down  to  our  own  day.  For  the  Family 
as  a  free  Institution  must  also  build  its  dwelling- 
place  artistically  as  well  as  Church  or  State. 

9.  The  Literature  of  the  Family  has  been  al- 
luded to  once  or  twice  in  the  preceding  account, 
and  it  perhaps  constitutes  the  greater  part  of 
human  writing.  Indeed  the  Family  is  probably 
the  genetic  source  of  Literature  as  it  is  of  all  In- 
stitutions. Love  has  begotten  song  and  its  many 
forms,  and  still  drives  the  human  being  to  utter 
himself  in  exalted  speech  more  powerfully  than 
any  other  emotion.  The  generative  Institution 
has  generated  poetry  naturally,  in  order  to  ex- 
press its  deepest  character. 

With  Love  rises  the  need  of  expression  and  of 
mirroring  the  Family  to  the  individual,  who  there- 
by becomes  aAvare  of  its  principle  and  its  move- 
ment. The  young  man  and  the  young  woman 
seek  to  be  conscious  of  the  Family ;  it  is  that 
toward  which  they  are  going,  and  their  strongest 
instinct  is  to  know  their  relations  and  their  re- 
sponsibilities in  that  Institution.     Now  there  is  a 


THE  FAMILY.  168 

realm,  in  fart,  an  Institution  whose  function  is 
to  reveal  themselves  to  themselves,  and  thereinto 
brinof  to  their  consciousness  the  nature,  the  duties 
and  the  conflicts  of  the  domestic  Institution,  and 
indeed  of  the  entire  institutional  world.  This  is 
the  main  function  of  Literature  and  Art,  both  of 
which  we  shall  later  see  to  be  phases  of  the  great 
Educative  Institution,  whose  chief  object  is  to  re- 
produce and  keep  alive  and  active  in  the  human 
soul  the  spirit  of  all  Institutions,  and  among 
them  specially  the  spirit  of  the  Family. 


CHAPTER   SECOND.— SOCIETY. 

We  have  at  present  reached  the  second  stage  in 
the  total  process  of  the  Secular  Institution,  of 
which  the  first  stage  has  just  been  given  —  the 
Family.  The  Will  now  utters  or  realizes  itself  in 
an  object  which  thereby  becomes  Property,  or  the 
u'illed  Product;  here  we  note  the  primal  psychi- 
cal act  of  separation  in  the  present  sphere.  This 
willed  Product,  however,  is  to  be  passed  through 
Societ}^  or  the  Social  Whole  in  some  form,  and 
returned  to  the  individual  for  his  sustenance. 
Thus  his  bodily  and  other  Wants  are  mediated 
through  the  Social  Institution,  instead  of  being 
gratified  immediately,  or  on  the  first  impulse. 
By  means  of  such  an  Institution,  not  one  man 
(164) 


SOCIETY.  165 

alone  can  live,  but  all  men  can  live  together,  and 
mutually  help  satisfy  one  another's  needs. 

The  social  Wants  have  been  usually  summed 
up  as  those  of  food,  raiment,  and  shelter.  Three 
outer  coverings  of  the  inner  Self  we  may  regard 
them ;  the  body  is  a  covering  which  is  reproduced 
by  food,  raiment  is  a  covering  for  the  body,  and 
shelter  is  a  covering  for  both,  that  is,  for  the 
body  clothed.  So  the  Self  surrounds  itself  with 
three  external  layers  in  succession,  which  consti- 
tute its  fundamental  Wants,  whereby  it  is  made 
to  actualize  itself  in  Society,  and  this  may  be 
deemed  its  deepest  need,  that  of  self -actualiza- 
tion in  the  Institution. 

The  term  Society  is  here  used  in  the  sense  of 
the  Economic  Body,  the  Industrial  Order,  the 
Commercial  World .  The  word  is  often  employed 
in  a  wider  meaning  than  this,  embracing  quite 
what  the  present  book  calls  Social  Institutions. 
While  the  two  usages  of  the  word  and  its  deriv- 
atives cannot  and  need  not  be  wholly  eschewed, 
we  shall  try,  in  the  present  chapter  especially, 
to  adhere  to  the  narrower  and  more  definite 
sense. 

We  may  derive  Society  externally  from  the 
Family,  since  a  number  of  Families  associated 
together  in  almost  any  sort  of  order  might  be 
called  a  Society.  But  such  a  relation  does  not 
count  for  much  in  this  connection,  as  we  may 
conceive  of  a  collection  of  Families  forminsr  the 


166  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

clan,  the  village,  or  indeed  the  nation.  Society, 
then,  means  something  more  than  the  mere  out- 
ward bringinsr  together  of  certain  units  called 
Families,  nor  is  it  simply  an  assemblage  of 
individuals. 

Society,  as  here  conceived,  is  an  Institution, 
which  is  always  human  Will  actualized,  made 
existent  in  the  world  and  functioning  there, 
whose  end  is  to  render  valid  Free  AVill. 
This,  as  already  stated,  is  the  common  prin- 
ciple of  all  Institutions,  but  Society  is  a  unique 
form  of  actualized  Will,  having  its  own  special 
character,  which  it  derives  from  its  starting- 
point,  namely  Want.  Man  has  Wants;  to  satisfy 
them  in  a  rational,  that  is,  universal  way,  he 
builds  Society. 

The  end  and  the  product  of  the  antecedent 
Family  was  the  Person,  born,  reared,  and  in  a 
degree  educated;  he  may  now  be  conceived  to 
hav^e  graduated  from  that  Institution  and  to  have 
entered  Society.  As  the  result  of  existence  he 
has  a  number  of  Wants ;  supremely  he  is  a  needcr 
of  things  physical,  and  perchance  intellectual. 
He  was  born  a  wantful  creature  into  the  Family, 
which  has  out  of  its  grace  supplied  his  early 
Wants ;  but  sooner  or  later  he  is  sent  forth  into 
the  great  world,  where  he  is  usually  expected  to 
supply  his  own  Wants.  Still  he  may  be  more 
needy  and  more  helpless  as  a  graduate  than  as  a 
babv,   unless    the    training   of    the  Family    has 


SOCIETY.  167 

helped  him  to  help  himself,  has  lifted  himself 
into  self-reliance  and  freedom. 

Accordingly  the  individual  passes  from  the 
Family  into  Society,  from  having  his  Wants  sat- 
isfied through  an  outside  power,  to  satisfying 
them  through  himself.  This  requires  exertion, 
production  of  some  kind,  labor;  yet  such  pro- 
duct does  not  directly  satisfy  his  Wants,  at  least 
not  in  most  cases.  He  has  to  bring;  it  not  to 
father  and  mother,  but  to  a  new  provider,  the 
Social  Whole,  which  in  return  for  his  effort 
gives  him  back  what  he  needs.  This  Social 
Whole  or  Society  is  now  to  be  inspected  inside 
and  outside,  and  unfolded. 

The  great  fact  of  Society,  then,  is  that  it  is  to 
mediate  human  Wants.  That  is,  man  is  not  to 
satisfy  his  Wants  immediately,  is  not  to  seize 
anything  at  hand  w4iich  may  sate  his  appetite  or 
still  his  desire,  like  the  wild  animal.  Only  to  a 
small  and  ever  diminishing  degree  can  he  directly 
accept  the  bounty  of  Nature.  More  and  more, 
as  he  advances  in  civilization,  he  nmst  mediate 
his  Wants  through  the  Social  Institution.  To  be 
sure,  the  assertion  of  the  individual  Will,  stimu- 
lated by  some  need,  is  the  starting-point,  but  it 
must  rise  to  the  universal  or  institutional  Will, 
which  returns  to  and  secures  the  individual  Will. 
So  it  comes  that  man's  first  Wants  are  to  be  social- 
ized ere  they  can  be  gratified,  and  herein  lies  the 
main  difference  between  civilization  and  barbarism . 


168  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Thus  the  Wants  of  the  individual,  as  the  con- 
tent of  his  Will,  must  be  mediated  by  the  Social 
Whole,  which  is  made  up  of  all  Wills  working  to 
satisfy  Wants.  For  this  Social  Whole  is  to  will 
the  gratification  of  the  Wants  of  all  the  members 
composing  it,  who  thereby  are  socialized  or  me- 
diated. Hence  I,  this  social  individual,  in  satis- 
fying my  Wants,  have  to  will  at  the  same  time 
the  satisfaction  of  the  Wants  of  all  other  mem- 
bers of  the  Social  Whole.  I  cannot  be  absolutely 
selfish  in  Society,  even  when  I  seek  my  own 
gratification.  I  have  to  will,  perhaps  uncon- 
sciously, the  satisfaction  of  others'  Wants  in 
order  to  satisfy  my  own.  Or  if  this  still  be 
called  selfish,  it  is  at  least  not  swinish.  Such  is 
the  appearance  of  the  Social  Institution,  which, 
however,  is  secular  (as  distinct  from  religious), 
inasmuch  as  it  secures  the  individual  Will  stimu- 
lated by  Want. 

I  cannot  eat  a  piece  of  bread  and  satisfy  my 
hunger  without  mediately  satisfying  the  hunger 
of  the  baker,  the  miller,  the  farmer,  in  fact  with- 
out involving  the  total  Social  Organism.  I  must 
feed  it  with  the  products  of  my  labor  in  order  to 
get  fed  myself;  and  in  feeding  it,  I  am  feeding 
the  feeder  of  all  like  myself.  Thus  the  Social 
Institution  strips  me  of  my  mere  individualism 
and  universalizes  me  even  through  my  bodily 
greeds,  making  my  animal  nature  over  by  a 
humanizing  process.     Such   at  least  is  the  pur- 


SOCIETY.  169 

pose  of  the  Institution,  though  it  can  be  per- 
yerted,  as  we  shall  see. 

The  social  movement,  then,  in  its  simplest 
sweep,  is  from  the  man  hungry,  through  the 
Institution,  back  to  the  man  satisfied.  This 
movement  will  draw  much  else  into  its  maelstrom, 
still  it  will  remain  to  the  end.  Every  day  the 
individual  body  of  each  living  being  has  to  be 
kept  renewing  and  reproducing  itself  —  this  is  its 
fundamental  Want.  To  meet  this  Want  the 
material  must  be  obtained  from  the  outside,  which 
means  effort,  exertion.  Will;  the  living  body 
must  make  itself  the  implement  of  its  own  life ; 
it  must  reduce  itself  to  a  means  in  order  to  be  its 
end;  through  activity  it  has  to  supply  fuel  just 
for  that  acti\dty ;  its  own  effort,  producing  sus- 
tenance, produces  the  condition  of  its  own 
effort. 

Thus  the  individual  Will  through  the  physical 
Body  has  to  return  to  itseK  and  reproduce  itself 
by  making  its  activity  possible.  To  that  start- 
ing-point from  which  it  goes  forth,  it  comes  back 
re-creating  the  same.  Now  this  phj'sical  process 
is  objectified  in  the  social  process.  In  like  man- 
ner we  have  seen  that  the  individual  Will  has  to 
return  to  itself  through  the  Social  Body  and  give 
validity  to  itself.  The  physical  Body  with  its 
Wants  finds  its  counterpart,  its  other  or  universal 
Body  in  the  Social  Institution,  which  truly  em- 
braces  everybody    as    one    Body,  and    which  is 


170  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

itself  a  Will  actualized,  whose  function  is  to 
make  valid  the  original  individual  Will. 

It  is  a  mistake,  however,  to  consider  Society 
simply  as  an  organism  whose  workings  can  be 
expressed  in  biological  terms ;  still  less  can  it  be 
considered  as  a  mechanism  and  be  expressed  in 
mechanical  terms.  Ultimately  Society  can  find 
the  adequate  utterance  of  its  principle  onh'  in 
psychology,  which  is  able  to  order  it  fully  and 
completely,  though  it  has  its  marked  analogies 
to  a  mechanism,  and  still  more  to  an  organism, 
both  of  which  may  be  drawn  into  use  for  helping 
ihustrate  its  process. 

The  Social  Body  (universal)  is,  then,  very  dif- 
ferent from  the  Human  Body  (individual)  ;  in 
fact,  from  the  highest  point  of  view  they  are 
opposites.  The  Social  Body  is  an  Institution 
not  an  animal  Body ;  it  is  the  latter  made  univer- 
sal and  existent  as  a  Whole  in  the  world,  the  one 
Body  embracing  all  Bodies.  Society  is  not  gen- 
erated like  the  bodily  organism  through  the  sexual 
pair,  but  is  the  work  of  the  Self,  the  Ego,  and 
shows  the  latter' s  process.  Its  function  is  not 
simply  to  give  back  assimilated  to  the  one  Body 
that  which  has  been  given  to  it  in  the  way  of 
food,  but  to  give  back  to  each  social  Individual 
what  he  has  contributed,  and  to  satisfy  thereby 
the  cycle  of  his  Wants.  Thus  we  may  conceive 
it  as  the  universal  Body  which  receives,  assimi- 
lates, and  returns   sustenance  to  all    its  diverse 


SOCIETY.  171 

particular  Bodies  which  furnish  its  food   in  the 
form  of  labor  or  the  willed  Product. 

Man  is  by  nature  as  hungry  as  the  all-devour- 
ing Ocean  or  as  gaping  Chaos;  he  is  born  into 
the  Social  Whole  with  mouth  wide  open,  and 
with  soul  far  wider-open.  He,  the  all-needing, 
needs  supremely  the  Universe ;  so  he  constructs 
out  of  his  soul  (or  self)  this  Universal  Body 
embracing  all  possible  Bodies  born  and  even 
unborn,  and  through  this  he  is  fed,  which  must 
at  the  same  time  satisfy  all  Wants  of  all  men. 

The  individual  Body  has  been  declared  to  have 
three  primary  Wants  —  food,  raiment,  shelter. 
The  Social  Body  may  be  said  to  have  these  same 
Wants,  though  in  a  different  way.  It  needs 
shelter  and  raiment,  it  also  must  be  protected 
against  the  strokes  of  Nature;  then,  too,  it  needs 
food,  Avhich  is  human  effort,  digesting  the  same 
in  its  capacious  stomach  and  distributing  what  it 
receives  to  its  individual  members  in  the  form  of 
food,  raiment,  and  shelter.  The  Social  Whole 
is  a  kind  of  universal  shelter  or  home,  also  a  vast 
clothing-store,  but  chiefly  a  prodigious  stomach. 
All  these  analogies  are  only  illustrative  helps,  and 
we  must  remember  that  the  illustration  of  the 
thino;  is  not  the  thing;  itself  and  is  not  the  actual 
statement  of  the  thing. 

The  business  world  may  be  taken  as  the  Social 
Whole ;  what  is  the  business  man  doing?  He  is 
active   in  supplying  people's  Wants  through  the 


172  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

total  Social  System.  The  vast  mass  of  mankind 
is  occupied  in  this  pursuit,  doing  business,  gain- 
ing a  livelihood,  or  making  money.  Every  man 
can  see  himself  as  a  link  in  the  social  chain; 
Want  impels  him  to  produce  for  some  Want, 
between  these  two  Wants  lies  the  Social  Institu- 
tion which  mediates  them. 

Accv)rdingly  we  observe  the  Will  putting  itself 
into  some  product  which  satisfies  Want.  Such 
effort  is  usually  called  labor  and  such  product  a 
commodity,  w^iich  is  the  original  purchase  money 
in  the  store  of  Society,  and  to  which  some  social 
reformers  wish  to  return,  abolishing  coined  money. 
Many  thousand  human  beings  with  their  daily 
Wants  and  their  daily  Work,  the  Products  of 
their  Will,  form  the  Social  Mill  which  is  grinding 
every  day ;  on  the  one  side  they  are  bringing  their 
grist  to  be  ground,  and  on  the  other  they  are 
taking  away  the  flour  for  supplying  their  needs. 
Externally  Society  has  this  mechanical  aspect, 
and  the  individual  working  in  it  can  be  reduced 
to  a  machine;  indeed,  instead  of  feeding  the 
machine,  he  can  be  fed  into  the  machine  and 
consumed  —  which  negativ  e  })ha.se  of  Society  is 
to  be  looked  into  hereafter  in  its   proper  place. 

Coming  back  to  the  product  into  which  the 
Will  puts  itself,  we  reach  the  conception  of 
Property,  a  most  important  social  element. 
When  the  individual  Will  realizes  itself  in  a 
thing,  this   becomes   its  Property,  whose  oharac- 


SOCIETY.  178 

teristic  thus  is  the  reaUty  of  the  Will  iti  the 
object ;  or  we  may  say,  the  existence  of  the  Per- 
son in  what  is  material.  The  willed  product 
may  well  be  deemed  the  pivot  of  the  Social 
Whole. 

We  have  alread}^  seen  Society  spring  out  of 
the  Family  externally ;  but  there  is  an  internal 
relation  of  which  we  may  now  speak.  Society 
is  in  a  way  the  universal  Family  with  humanity 
as  its  offspring;  it  is  the  universal  father  and 
mother  who  no  longer  give  to  their  children  food 
immediately  but  only  mediately,  through  work, 
whereby  these  are  compelled  to  win  their  free- 
dom. The  ideal  end  of  Society's  compulsion, 
which  uses  human  Want  as  its  pitiless  goad,  is 
to  force  man  to  be  free.  But  there  is  a  negative 
side,  as  already  hinted,  to  this  ideal  striving; 
Society  can  become  a  mighty  tyrant,  an  all-de- 
vouring stomach,  a  colossal  machine  which  grinds 
to  death  the  free-acting  spirit.  In  an  industrial 
crisis  the  individual  has  quite  no  control  over  his 
own  lot.  Society,  though  its  purpose  is  to  ac- 
tualize freedom,  can  turn  just  to  the  opposite,  to 
a  despotic,  destructive  energy ;  it  can  become 
the  colossal  cannibal,  veritably  the  Hesiodic  Saturn 
devouring  his  own  children 

But  Society  has  the  power  of  overcoming  its 
own  negative  power ;  it  is,  as  we  say,  progessive, 
evolutionary,  limit-transcending,  being  made  up 
of  limit-transcending  Egos,  in  whose  nature  it 


174  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

must  participate.  Yet  there  is  always  present 
the  other  tendency,  which  is  just  the  matter  to 
be  overcome.  The  danger  of  the  agriculturist  is 
that  he  drop  down  to  a  mere  vegetative  life,  cling- 
ino-  to  the  soil  like  a  plant,  and  unfree  even  in 
locomotion.  The  danger  of  the  manufacturer  is 
that  he  drop  down  to  a  mere  mechanical  life  de- 
termined by  the  social  mill,  becoming  himself  the 
machine  which  he  ought  to  control.  Yet  the 
social  individual  can  rise  out  of  such  limits,  is 
doing  so  continuously. 

Such  is,  in  general,  the  thought  of  Society  as 
a  whole,  or  the  germinal  unit  out  of  which  it 
develops.  "We  shall  now  proceed  to  follow  this 
development  in  sufficient  detail  to  show  its  main 
outlines.  It  will  have  three  chief  stages,  reveal- 
ing the  process  which  is  and  has  been  at  work 
producing  it  at  present  and  from  the  beginning. 
This  process  is  fundamentally  psychological,  a 
product  of  the  Self  which  turns  about  and  cog- 
nizes the  Self  as  the  inner  moving  principle  in  all 
social  development.  Accordingly,  we  may  call 
it  the  Social  Psychosis,  whose  movement  is  as 
follows :  — 

I.  Positive  Society;  this  shows  Society  as 
it  is,  organizing  itself  and  reproducing  itself 
continually  as  an  Institution  existent  in  the  world, 
with  its  process  of  mediating  the  producer  of  the 
willed  Product  and  the  receiver  or  consumer  of 
the  same;  this  willed  Product  (or   Property)  of 


SOCIETY.  175 

tlie  individual  producer  or  owuer  is  shown  mov- 
ing through  Society  or  the  Social  Whole  to  the 
one  who  uses  it,  and  calling  forth  a  great  variet}' 
of  social  forms  for  its  mediation,  from  the  most 
simple  to  the  most  complex. 

II.  N'tgative  Society;  this  shows  the  reverse 
movement  of  Society,  when  it  dissolves  and  breaks 
up  into  its  constituents,  which  become  antago- 
nistic to  each  other.  The  Social  Individual  and 
the  Social  Whole  separate  and  collide ;  the  So- 
cial Whole,  after  assailing  the  Social  Individual 
and  then  being  assailed  by  him  in  turn,  will  no 
longer  socialize  his  willed  Product,  but  will 
change  to  a  Perverted  Societv,  which  will  iinallv 
reduce  social  man  back  to  his  beginning,  to  the 
natural  individual  at  the  starting  point  of  his 
social  ascent. 

III.  The  Evolution  of  Society ;  this  shows  the 
rise  of  the  natural  individual  to  the  Social  Whole ; 
it  is,  therefore,  the  return  out  of  mere  nature  to 
Positive  Society  and  completes  the  process  which 
we  have  called  the  Social  Psychosis.  It  is  prac- 
tically the  counterpart  and  the  corrective  of  the 
negative  revolutionary  movement  just  given,  and 
theoretically  it  is  the  refutation  of  the  decadent, 
pessimistic  view  of  the  Social  Order. 

The  recent  epoch  has  unfolded  Evolution  in 
response  to  Revolution,  and  shows  the  ascent 
overcoming  the  descent  of  man.  The  response 
to  the  shout  "  Back  to  Nature,"  is  now  heard  in 


176  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  cry  "  For-^ard  to  the  Institution."  Yet 
both  the  descendinof  and  the  ascendino-  move- 
ments  are  integral  parts  of  the  total  social 
process.  Ever}'  science  in  these  days  must  reckon 
with  Evolution,  or  be  one-sided;  yet  it  is  equally 
one-sided  to  regard  Evolution  as  the  whole  of  the 
scientific  procedure. 

It  is  becoming  more  and  more  evident  to  in- 
vestigators that  the  pivot  on  which  Social  Evolu- 
toin  turns  is  Propert}'^,  or  the  human  Will  realized 
in  the  thing,  which  we  shall  call  the  willed 
Product,  thus  indicating  its  psj'chical  source.  In 
recent  years  a  great  activity  has  been  shown  in 
tracing  the  origin  and  historic  movement  of 
Property,  especially  as  manifested  in  early  socie- 
ties. The  basic  fact  of  Property  is  social  recog- 
nition, not  simply  individual  possession;  that  I 
have  this  thing  is  not  enough,  my  ha\Ting  it  must 
be  recognized  by  others  and  defended  by  some 
form  of  a  society.  Property  is  not  through  my- 
self alone,  I  must  be  supplemented  by  the  Social 
Whole  for  its  right  possession. 

How  was  man  trained  to  Propert}',  to  recog- 
nize it  as  another's  and  to  maintain  the  right  of 
the  other  as  really  his  own?  In  general  the  an- 
swer may  be  given:  by  the  primitive  Community, 
to  which  all  property  at  first  belonged,  and  to 
which  the  individual  himself  immediately  be- 
longed, as  is  the  case  largely  to-day  in  the  Village 
Community,  for    example  in    the  Russian  mir. 


SOCIETY.  177 

Here,  then,  fixed  Property  begins  to  arise,  being 
made  so,  not  by  one,  but  by  all,  by  the  Social 
Whole.  What  it  assigns  to  the  individual  is  his 
own,  and  recognized  as  his  own  (^proprium)  by 
each  member,  who  must  not  take  the  food,  for 
instance,  which  has  been  assigned  to  another. 
Thus  all  are  trained  to  Property  by  the  Com- 
munity ;  which  is  accordingly  the  Property- 
making  social  unit  over  the  entire  world  and 
through  all  time.  Not  the  Family  is  the  creative 
unit  of  Society,  but  the  primal  Community ;  the 
Family  we  have  already  called  the  institutional 
cell,  or  the  creative  source  of  all  Institutions 
in  general.  Property,  then,  is  at  first  communal, 
not  individual  nor  domestic  ;  the  act  of  training 
the  race  to  Property  is  performed  by  the  social 
Institution.  Undoubtedly  the  individual  can  have 
a  possession  by  mere  seizure,  but  he  can  have  a 
true  ownership  only  through  an  institutional 
confirmation 

I.  Positive  Society. 

Society,  then,  starts  with  tne  individual  who 
has  Wants,  which  stimulate  him  to  effort,  which 
effort  results  in  a  willed  Product.  Such  a  Prod- 
uct is,  accordingly.  Will  realized  in  an  object, 
is  what  becomes  Property  of  some  sort,  which 
has  in  it  Want,  Will,  and  Thing.  The  Ego  is 
now  the    producer,  who  may  consume  his  own 

13 


178  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

product  directly,  but  usually  it  is  passed  through 
the  Social  Whole,  and  thus  is  socialized. 

This  Social  Whole  receives  the  willed  Product, 
measures  and  pays  the  value  thereof  according  to 
its  own  standard,  and  disposes  of  the  same  to  the 
consumer.  It  mediates  the  two  extremes,  the 
producing  and  the  consuming  Egos,  making  the 
one  work  for  all  and  the  other  receive  from  all, 
ere  their  respective  wants  can  be  satisfied.  Thus 
it  socializes  both. 

The  consumer  receives  from  the  Social  Whole 
the  willed  Product  of  the  producer,  uses  it  for 
his  purpose,  and  thereby  satisfies  his  Wants. 
Thus  between  the  first  Want  of  the  producer  and 
the  final  satisfaction  of  the  consumer's  Want  lies 
the  social  process.  To  satisfy  my  Want,  Society 
makes  me  satisfy  that  of  another  man,  or  indeed 
of  all  men. 

It  is  manifest  that  the  willed  Product  is  what 
is  taken  up,  passed  through,  and  finally  assimi- 
lated by  the  social  process.  Metaphorically  we 
may  say  that  it  is  the  food  which  the  Social  Body 
has  to  digest  and  transmute  into  its  living  mem- 
bers. 

This  willed  Product  is  in  its  simplest  stage  when 
produced  by  the  one  individual  Will ;  but  when 
many  Wills  share  in  its  production  and  each  has 
to  be  assigned  its  share  out  of  the  one  Product, 
the  Social  Whole  appears,  which  is  to  measure 
out  to  each  Will  its  own.     This  is  the  institu- 


SOCIETY.  179 

tional  element  of  Society  which  is  herein  seen 
giving  validity  to  the  Will  of  man,  the  producer. 
Thus  we  behold  a  process  in  the  Products,  which 
process  has  three  stages :  the  single-willed  Prod- 
uct, the  many-willed  Product,  and  the  all-willed 
Product. 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  unity  in  all  these 
distinctions  is  the  willed  Product ^  indicating  the 
activity  of  the  Will  realized  in  some  form  of 
Property.  Still  further,  we  shall  employ  these 
compound  words  in  order  to  designate  the  ad- 
vancing association  of  human  beings  toward  uni- 
versal combination  —  single-,  many-,  aZ?- willed. 
The  reader  will  likewise  notice  the  psychical 
movement  suggested  by  the  foregoing  terms : 
from  simplicity,  through  multiplicity,  back  to 
unity.  Thus  the  willed  Product  becomes  quite 
complex  in  Society,  but  it  has  one  fundamental 
process;  it  starts  from  the  individual  Will  (or 
Will  of  individuals),  is  confirmed  by  the  Social 
Will,  and  is  returned  in  some  form  to  the  indi- 
vidual Will. 

Out  of  these  three  stages  of  the  willed  Prod- 
uct spring  three  forms  of  mediation  (or  ex- 
change), which  is  performed  by  the  Social 
Whole  functioned,  as  it  has  to  be,  by  an  indi- 
vidual whom  we  may  call  the  Middleman.  Three 
mediating  individuals,  accordingly,  we  see,  three 
Middlemen,  whose  province  is  to  mediate  the 
willed  Product,  who  preside  over  its  process  from 


180  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

production  to  oonsuiiiptioii,  which  is  ever  rising 
to  vaster  proportions.  Tlie  single- willed  Product 
calls  forth  the  mercantile  Middleman,  the  trader 
or  merchant,  w^hose  medium  of  exchange  rises 
from  mere  barter  to  money.  The  many -willed 
Product  calls  forth  the  industrial  Middleman, 
with  his  manufactures  and  his  capital  or  organ- 
ized money.  The  all- willed  Product  calls  forth 
the  universal  Middleman,  the  monopolist,  who 
controls  one  or  several  branches  of  industry, 
controls  transportation  to  the  market,  and  finally 
Avields  the  complete  organization  of  money  in 
the  Bourse  or  money  market. 

Thus  the  Product  of  the  single  Will  begins  the 
social  movement,  and  the  latter  ends  in  the  Prod- 
uct of  the  single  Will,  for  Monopoly  is  also  a 
single- willed  Product,  and  so  returns  to  the  unity 
of  the  first  stage,  which  unity,  however,  con- 
tains the  multiplicity,  or  rather  the  totality  of 
Wills.  Positive  Society  or  the  normal  Social 
Order,  as  it  exists  to-day  in  the  world,  has  all 
three  stages  above-mentioned,  as  well  as  the  three 
corresponding  Middlemen,  mercantile,  industrial, 
monopolistic.  In  fact  they  form  now  three  main 
co-existent  classes  of  Society,  and  constitute  in 
themselves  a  process  w^iicli  reveals  the  Psycho- 
sis—  the  latter  again  breaking  up  into  manj'^ 
subordinate  movements.  Democracy,  with  its 
manyness,  must  be  monocracy  also,  though  not 
monarchy;  democratic  Society,  with  its  multitu- 


SOCIETY.  181 

dinous  units  of  Will,  must  be  always  passing  into 
monopoly  of  some  kind,  which  need  not  be  hurt- 
ful to  freedom,  though  it  certainly  may  become 
so.  Accordingly  we  shall  now  look  at  the  Social 
Whole  evolving  itself  through  the  willed  Product, 
which  development  has  not  merely  taken  place  in 
the  past,  but  is  going  on  continuously,  with  all 
its  elements  present,  both   simple  and  complex. 

I.  The  single-willed  Product.  In  the 
present  sphere  we  are  to  consider  the  single  Will 
producing  the  single  Product.  Each  is  a  unit; 
the  Will  is  individual  (Ego)  and  the  Product  is 
also  individual  (Thing).  This  is  in  contrast  to 
the  many-willed  Product,  which  has  in  its  pro- 
duction a  plurality  of  Wills.  Three  men  catching 
fish  with  hook  and  line  in  a  free  stream  have,  as  a 
result  of  their  labor,  each  a  single-willed  Prod- 
uct; but  the  same  men  catching  fish  in  common 
with  a  drag-net,  call  forth  a  many -willed  Product. 

But  the  one  Will  with  its  Product  is  brought 
into  contact  and  association  with  another  Will 
and  its  Product,  whereby  the  primitive  social 
process  begins.  They  exchange  their  Products, 
and  thus  show  a  common  Will  in  their  mutual 
recognition  of  each  other's  Product.  As  the 
representative  and  the  realization  of  this  common 
Will  the  middleman  as  trader  or  merchant  ap- 
pears, who  is  the  mediator  between  the  two  single 
Wills  —  producer  and  consumer  —  he  being  the 
third  single  Will.     Such  is  the  general  sweep  of 


182  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

this  sphere,  which  we  shall  now  carry  out  in  a 
little  more  detail. 

1.  The  one  Will  and  i(s  Product.  The  earliest 
and  most  immediate  form  of  the  single-willed 
Product  is  seen  in  the  act  of  seizing,  possessing 
and  consuming  the  external  object.  Such  an  act 
belongs  to  the  living  organism,  and  every  animal 
performs  it  in  one  way  or  other.  It  is  confined 
to  the  individual  body,  which  thus  manifests  im- 
mediate want  and  immediate  gratification.  Yet 
here  we  may  observe  the  social  cycle  implicit, 
involved  in  nature,  the  primal  potentiality  of 
Society  in  the  aniraal  organism. 

(1)  There  is  the  first  exertion  of  the  "Will  in 
seizing  the  thing,  being  impelled  by  desire.  This 
is  the  crude  form  and  original  of  labor,  which 
will  continue  to  seize  and  transform  the  thingf. 
Still  we  must  remember  that  the  Will  has  to  ex- 
ternalize itself  in  order  to  be  ^Vill ;  the  Ego  can- 
not be  itself  unless  it  divides  within  and  utters 
itself ;  such  an  utterance  takes  form  in  the  ex- 
ternal Thing.  (2)  This  external  Thing  is  pri- 
marily will-less,  a  mere  physical  object.  But 
through  seizure  it  is  filled  with  a  Will,  it  becomes 
personal  (though  not  a  Person);  it  is  Property, 
the  Ego's  own,  in  the  first  crude  stage  of  mere 
possession,  not  yet  confirmed  by  the  recognition 
of  others.  (3)  This  external  Thing  is  internal- 
ized, completing  the  cycle  in  gratification,  or  con- 
sumption.    It  thus  goes  back  into  the  organism, 


SOCIETY.  183 

which  was  the  possibility  of  the  first  activity  of 
the  Will  in  seizinor  the  Things.  In  such  fashion 
the  first  exertion,  going  forth  into  the  willed 
Product,  has  returned  and  produced  itself. 

The  individual  Will  must  utter  itself  in  the 
willed  Product,  in  order  to  be  Will,  and  rise  to 
Ego,  Person.  Also  the  external  Thing  of  Nature 
finds  its  true  reality  and  destiny  in  becoming  the 
willed  Product  in  order  to  rise  to  Property.  The 
previous  organic  cycle  of  the  one  Will  is  the  un- 
born social  process  whose  whole  striving  and  end 
is  to  be  born,  to  pass  from  potentiality  to  reality. 

But  the  object  external  to  this  one  Will  is  not 
only  athing,  but  another  Will,  a  Person.  So  next 
we  have  to  consider  such  duplication  of  Wills 
with  their  interaction.  Really  in  the  Thing 
possessed  my  Will  has  become  objective ;  the 
next  step  is  to  separate  and  to  recognize  the 
objective  Will  which  is  distinct  from  mine  and 
also  externalized  in  the  Thing. 

2.  The  tivo  WiUfi  exchanging  Products.  Each 
is  the  single  Will  with  the  single-willed  Product. 
Both  are  brought  together,  the  two  Egos,  the 
two  boys,  each  with  his  ball ;  each  covets  the 
other's  possession.  Thus  follows  the  exchange 
of  willed  Products  —  a  very  important  act  in 
social  development.  For  in  such  exchange  there 
is  the  recognition  by  each  of  the  other's  Will  in 
the  Thing,  whereby  we  rise  to  a  higher  stage  of 
Property.     Not  only  do  I  now  possess  my  object 


184  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

through  immediate  seizure,  through  ray  own  Will, 
but  also  through  another's  Will,  since  he  wills  to 
give  me  his  object  for  mine.  So  the  violence  of 
Nature  has  begun  to  cease,  and  a  social  Will  has 
at  least  put  forth  a  bud.  But  the  two  Wills  do 
not  come  into  complete  agreement  without  a 
process. 

(1)  The  immediate  exchange  of  single-willed 
Products  is  known  as  Barter,  or  "  swapping.'' 
In  this  act  there  is  an  implicit  recognition  of 
each  by  the  other ;  each  unconsciously  ac- 
knowledg-es  the  other's  right  to  the  Thiuo-. 
Both  are  producers,  both  consumers;  but  each 
consumes  or  uses  the  other's  Product.  Thus 
there  is  an  underlying  unity  of  the  two  Wills, 
which  have  formed  together  a  small  Society  in 
the  simple  act  of  Barter.  (2)  But  the  process 
does  not  generally  complete  itself  without  a  strug- 
gle. The  individual  Will  asserts  itself  against 
this  unity,  against  even  this  little  social  act  of 
primitive  exchange,  and  seizes  the  other's  object 
immediately.  So  we  have  the  negation  of  Barter, 
which  is  Plunder;  the  consumer  will  not  pro- 
duce, but  takes  the  willed  Product,  and  thus 
destroys  Will  through  his  Will.  The  outcome 
must  be  that  his  deed  has  to  be  returned  to  him, 
his  Will  to  destroy  Will  must  be  given  back 
to  him,  and  thus  be  itself  destroyed.  Such  is 
the  stage  of  primitive  social  conflict  which  ends 
in  putting  down  the  negative  Will  through  some 


SOCIETY.  185 

kind  of  punishment.  (3)  The  positive  result  of 
such  conflict  is  the  recognition  of  one  Will  b}'^ 
the  other  in  its  Product,  which  recognition  is  not 
the  first  impKcit  recognition  of  Barter,  but  is 
explicit,  and  is  expressed  in  custom  or  primitive 
law.  Now  we  have  Property  in  its  third  stage, 
the  first  being  the  immediate  exertion  of  the  Will 
in  the  Product,  the  second  being  the  implicit 
recognition  of  that  Will  in  Barter ;  this  third 
stage  shows  Property  consciously  recognized,  or 
the  willed  Product  acknowledged  by  the  Will  of 
the  other,  and  perchance  directly  secured  by  the 
latter' s  help. 

The  process  of  the  two  Wills  has  started  nu- 
merous social  elements  into  their  first  early  life. 
Right,  Law,  a  remote  hint  of  the  State  with  its 
justices  lie  here  imbedded  but  sprouting.  Wealth , 
Value,  reward  for  Labor  may  be  seen  peeping 
forth ;  also  a  moral  training  has  begun  in  the 
suppression  of  the  immediate  desire  to  seize  what 
you  want,  since  the  object  belongs  to  another. 
Especially  the  Social  Whole  has  evolved  out  of 
a  purely  internal  organic  process  in  the  one  in- 
dividual into  an  external  movement  between  two 
Wills,  both  of  which  have  recognized  their  unity 
and  have  subordinated  themselves  to  the  same, 
thus  acknowledging  a  power  over  themselves 
which  is  really  institutional,  since  through  it 
both  Wills  are  made  free  in  their  activity,  indeed 
are  willing  each  other's  Free  Will.     For  when 


186  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  one  recognizes  the  other  in  the  willed  Prod- 
uct, and  gives  validity  to  such  recognition 
through  exchange,  the  act  is  institutional ;  the 
two  Wills  are  becominsf  socialized,  each  throucrh 
the  other,  and  have  begun  to  act  and  to  live  in  a 
third  element,  the  social. 

Now  this  third  element  called  for  by  the  two 
Wills,  is  next  to  be  represented  in  a  third  person 
or  a  third  Will,  which,  so  to  speak,  takes  its 
place  between  the  two  previous  Wills  and  medi- 
ates them  through  their  Products. 

3.  The  Third  Will  as  Middleman.  In  the 
previous  stage  the  two  producers  were  still  sep- 
arated, perchance  were  in  opposition;  the  one 
does  not  want  the  other's  product  in  exchange 
for  his  own.  The  consumer  and  the  producer 
are  divided  b}'^  space,  time,  different  needs  and 
many  other  causes ;  thus  the  willed  Product  is 
left  idle,  and  exertion  finds  not  its  recompense. 
The  result  is  the  appearance  of  the  third  person, 
the  middleman,  the  mediator  mediating  anew  the 
dualism  between  producer  and  consumer.  Thus 
arises  the  trader  by  profession,  the  merchant 
who  will  call  forth  a  new  class  by  performing  a 
new  function  among  men.  He  is  the  first  real 
embodiment  of  the  coming  Social  Whole,  a  vis- 
ible personification  of  it,  a  person  now  function- 
ing the  Social  Institution  in  its  incipient  form. 
But  here  too  it  becomes  necessary  to  note  with 
care  the  process. 


SOCIETY.  1«7 

(1)  The  first  form  in  which  the  middleman 
appears  in  relation  to  the  two  other  Wills,  w^hich 
we  may  call  the  producer  and  the  consumer,  is 
still  that  of  Barter,  or  the  immediate  exchange 
of  Products.  The  middleman  is  also  a  pro- 
ducer like  the  two  others,  one  of  whom,  we  may 
suppose,  does  not  want  the  Product  of  the  other, 
and  so  there  is  no  exchange.  But  the  middleman 
now  steps  in  and  exchanges  his  Product  which 
is  wanted  by  the  first  man  for  one  which  he  him- 
self does  not  want  for  consumption,  well  know- 
inof  that  he  can  exchange  with  the  second  man 
whose  Product  he  does  w^ant  for  consumption. 
So  through  him  and  his  Product  all  three  are 
satisfied  by  mutual  exchange.  But  note  the  dif- 
ference between  this  middleman  and  the  two 
others  ;  he  is  the  one  who  has  knowledge  —  knowl- 
edge of  the  wants  and  of  what  vnW  satisfy  the 
wants ;  in  other  words,  he  knows  the  supplj^ 
and  the  demand,  and  also  what  will  bring  them 
together.  The  intelligence  of  the  merchant  is 
his,  even  in  the  primitive  form  of  the  barterer 
or  "swapper;  "  or  possibly  instinct  we  should 
call  it,  the  instinct  of  the  trader,  which  often 
appears  in  the  small  boy. 

(2)  The  one  willed  Product  in  exchange  be- 
comes many  willed  Products  in  exchange ;  the 
middleman  makes  himself  a  universal  medium  of 
exchange  for  his  neighborhood;  he  has  a  store, 
has  capital,  has   profit.     Still   it    is  an  cxehniigi; 


188  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

of  willed  Products.  But  the  middlemen  also  are 
multiplied  as  well  as  their  articles  of  exchange, 
thus  arise  competition,  division  of  labor,  in  gen- 
eral the  market,  which  includes  them  all,  and 
shows  the  diversified  trade-world,  to  which  each 
individual  brings  what  he  produces  and  receives 
what  he  needs  in  return.  Thus  his  Will  is  made 
valid  not  simply  through  himself  but  through 
others,  many  or  perchance  all  others. 

But  limitations  to  this  exchange  of  articles  have 
appeared.  In  the  first  case  the  middleman  as 
barterer  cannot  mediate  his  two  men,  if  neither 
of  them  wants  the  article  of  the  other.  That  is, 
one  of  them  must  desire  the  article  of  the  other, 
if  the  middleman  is  to  effect  the  exchange.  Then 
the  middleman  may  want  the  article  which  the 
producer  brings,  but  may  not  have  the  article 
which  the  latter  wants.  Hence  the  call  for  a 
universal  article  of  exchange,  and  it  is  forth- 
comino-. 

(3)  This  is  money,  in  which  the  middleman 
has,  so  to  speak,  become  the  middle  thing,  which 
mediates  all  things.  Money  is  the  willed  Product 
which  is  exchanged  for  any  willed  Product  what- 
ever. Every  man  possessing  money  is  his  own 
middleman,  and  commands  every  willed  Product 
in  exchange.  It  is,  therefore,  what  all  men  want, 
being  just  that  want  which  frees  from  all  want. 
It  is  the  universal  willed  Product,  all  things  are 
convertible  into  it  and  it  into  all  things.     Money 


SOCIETY.  189 

confers  freedom  on  the  one  hand,  and  power  on 
the  other,  which  power  can  become  tyranny. 
Hence  some  social  reformers  have  sought  to 
abolish  it,  but  it  is  an  inherent  evolution  of  the 
Social  Whole. 

In  the  process  of  the  Three  Wills  just  con- 
sidered, the  middleman  in  a  way  has  been  con- 
verted into  mone3^  His  act  of  mediation  is  now 
performed  by  a  willed  Product  which  may  be  in 
the  hands  of  every  man.  Tlie  middleman's  Will 
is  thus  objectified,  put  into  an  object.  Still  the 
merchant  is  not  lost  to  the  Social  Whole,  though 
he  be  no  longer  the  barterer.  He  too  employs 
the  universal  medium  of  exchange,  of  himself  he 
converts  himself  into  money. 

Moreover  in  money  the  single-willed  Product 
has  completed  its  movement.  At  the  start  the 
single-willed  Product  was  purely  individual,  but 
now  it  has  become  universal  through  the  social 
process  which  has  just  been  set  forth.  Money  is 
a  kind  of  pawn,  and  the  Social  Whole  a  kind  of 
pawn-broker's  shop,  to  which  the  j^awn  is  brought 
and  exchanged.  Properly  money  is  the  middle- 
man's Product  as  sino;le- willed,  which  single- 
willed  Product  must  possess  his  peculiar  power  of 
exchano;e,  as  against  all  other  si no;le- willed  Prod- 
ucts.  Or  we  may  say,  somewhat  awkwardly 
perhaps,  that  the  particular  single-willed  Product 
(some  article),  must  be  transformed  into  the 
universal  single-willed  Product  (money),  which 


190  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

in  its  turn  is  transformed  back  into  a  particular 
single-willed  Product  (another  article).  It  will 
thus  be  seen  that  the  single-willed  Product  in 
itself  goes  through  the  social  process  by  means 
of  money,  is  socialized,  and  therein  completes  its 
c^^cle.  Every  piece  of  money  that  we  handle  has 
in  it  just  this  complete  social  process,  and  this  is 
what  makes  it  money.  The  individual,  receiving 
a  coin  for  his  service  and  passing  it  for  another 
service,  is  making  it  live  its  life.  The  movement 
is  the  single-willed  Product,  first  as  particular, 
then  as  universal,  then  back  to  the  particular. 

Thus  the  single-willed  Product  has  unfolded  the 
mercantile  Person  (merchant)  and  the  mercantile 
Thing  (money) ;  one  is  subject,  the  other  is  ob- 
ject, one  internal,  the  other  external.  But  both 
exist  for  social  mediation ;  each  has  this  social 
process  and  is  a  medium  of  exchange.  Thus  the 
social  Wliole  in  the  present  sphere  has  its  own 
inner  and  outer  mediator,  its  own  middle-man  and 
middle-thino^  for  functioninoj  itself. 

In  the  history  of  Political  Economy  the  Mer- 
cantilists (Colbert)  thought  that  money  as  such 
was  the  source  of  wealth.  The  Physiocrats  held 
that  land  was  the  source  of  wealth  (Quesnay). 
Adam  Smith  in  general  took  labor  (the  willed 
Product)  to  be  the  source  of  wealth,  hence  he  was 
the  prophet  of  modern  productive  industry. 

The  single-willed  Product,  when  the  dominant 
social  fact,  has  its  home  specially  in  the  Village 


SOCIETY.  11>1 

Community,  which  has  for  the  most  part  three 
chisses  of  producers  —  users  of  the  soil  (agricul- 
turists and  shepherds),  artisans,  and  tradesmen. 
This  simple  village  life  will  persist  underneath  the 
more  complex  social  forms  hereafter  unfolded . 

The  middleman  adds  to  the  single-willed  Prod- 
uct a  new  Will,  namely  his  own,  which  gives  an 
increased  value  to  the  article  which  has  passed 
through  his  hands.  Thus  we  have  really  a  double- 
willed  Product,  or  perchance  a  many-willed  Prod- 
uct —  wherewith  we  have  passed  to  a  new  branch 
of  our  subject. 

II.  The  Many- Willed  Product. — Many 
Wills  now  enter  into  one  Product,  each  contrib- 
uting its  effort.  In  case  of  the  single-willed 
Product  just  considered,  one  Will  entered  into 
one  Product,  or,  possibly,  into  many  separate 
Products.  Previously  multiplicity  might  lie  in 
the  things  produced ;  now  it  lies  in  the  Wills 
producing,  while  the  Product  is  one.  Thus  we 
reach  the  sphere  of  separation  in  the  willed 
Product,  this  separation  being  through  the  causa- 
tive energy,  the  Will. 

The  present  fact  will  be  found  to  introduce  very 
important  elements  into  the  Social  Whole.  As 
the  latter  is  actualized  Will  whose  function  is  to 
make  valid  the  individual  Will,  giving  to  the  same 
the  just  reward  of  effort,  it  comes  upon  new  con- 
ditions and  new  difficulties  in  the  present  sphere. 
For  instance,  how  is  Society  to  ascertain  the  just 


192  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

share  of  the  laborer  in  a  vast  complicated  Prod- 
uct, not  only  of  many  Wills,  but  of  many  kinds 
of  Wills?  Here  distinctively  the  social  question 
comes  up,  and  the  social  conflict  between  labor 
and  capital,  as  it  is  popularly  called.  Thus  the 
many-willed  Product  will  have  its  distinct  place 
and  process  in  the  development  of  the  Social 
Order. 

Indeed  the  many- willed  Product  is  specially 
the  social  Product,  being  the  combined  work  of 
many  associated  Wills.  The  single-w^illed  Prod- 
uct is  individual  and  remains  so  throuohout  its 
process,  though  the  Wills  associate  externally 
and  exchange  their  individual  Products.  But 
now  the  association  is  not  in  the  exchansre  but  in 
the  production  itself  of  the  object;  thus  each 
Will  becomes  intertwined  and  comminoled  with 
other  Wills,  all  being  bound  fast,  and  as  it  were 
imprisoned  in  their  common  Product.  Here,  then, 
will  arise  supremely  the  realm  of  conflict  between 
these  Wills  —  the  conflict  over  their  respective 
shares. 

We  saw  the  commercial  middleman  evolved 
out  of  the  socializing  process  of  the  single-willed 
Product.  But  when  the  middleman  has  taken 
the  single-willed  Product,  and  therein  added  his 
Will  or  effort,  it  is  no  longer  snigle-willed,  for 
two  or  more  Wills  have  entered  into  its  present 
status.  Thus  we  pass  to  the  many-willed  Prod- 
uct.    But  this  too  is  subjected  to   a  socializing 


SOCIETY.  193 

process,  and  will  evolve  a  new  middleman, 
namely,  the  industrial  one,  who  is  the  culmina- 
tion and  conclusion  of  the  many -willed  Product. 
This  process,  going  through  its  psychical  move- 
ment (for  it  is  Will,  Ego)  is  what  we  are  now  to 
consider. 

The  first  and  most  immediate  stage  of  the 
many-willed  Product  is  that  it  is  all  of  one  kind 
essentially,  hence  divisible  and  measurable  quan- 
titatively according  to  the  participating  Wills. 
This  we  shall  call  the  homogeneous  many-willed 
Product.  But  soon  we  shall  find  entering  such 
a  Product  qualitative  differences,  not  mathemati- 
cally measurable,  such  as  skill  and  other  qualities 
of  the  workman,  and  finally  capital  in  some  form. 
Thus  arises  the  heterogeneous  many -willed  Product, 
out  of  which  is  born  the  grand  struggle  between 
labor  and  capital.  Finally  this  struggle  will  be 
harmonized,  at  least  for  a  time,  by  the  new  mid- 
dleman who  is  called  forth  by  it,  and  w^e  shall 
see  the  heterogeneous  many-willed  Product  me- 
diated, whose  mediator  is  just  the  middleman 
already  mentioned. 

Such  is  the  process  of  what  we  here  call  the 
many-willed  Product,  inasmuch  as  we  seek  to 
carry  it  back  always  to  its  psychical  fountain- 
head  in  the  Ego  as  Will. 

1.  The  homogeneous  many -willed  Product. 
This  is  the  simple  form  of  the  many-wulled  Prod- 
uct, in  which  several  Wills  co-operate  in  pro- 
is 


1'j4  social  institutions. 

clucing  some  result  or  object.  Now  these  Wills 
are  supposed  to  be  homogeneous,  all  of  a  kind, 
and  to  labor  equally.  What  they  produce  will 
be  also  homogeneous,  capable  of  a  simple  quanti- 
tative measurement  and  division. 

Let  three  men  fish  in  a  free  stream  with  a 
seine  which  has  been  given  them.  The  product 
of  their  effort  can  be  divided  into  three  shares, 
.each  man  taking  a  share.  Not  only  the  Wills  of 
the  different  men  are  homogeneous,  but  the 
labor  is  so  too,  there  being  no  difference  in  skill. 
Here,  then,  labor,  even  of  a  many-willed  Product 
gets  its  own  with  mathematic  exactness,  and  we 
see  the  primal  state  of  social  simplicity,  which 
will  remain  the  laborer's  ideal.  The  socialist 
will  seek  to  get  back  to  this  social  Paradise  in 
which  the  workman  is  to  receive  the  measure 
equivalent  of  his  effort.  The  bounty  of  Nature 
(the  free  stream  for  fishing)  and  the  seine  (the 
means  of  production)  are  to  be  restored  to  him 
if  the}^  are  ever  taken  away.  The  many-willed 
Product  is  thus  homogeneous  and  measurable. 

Accordingly  the  simple  Product  of  many  Wills 
shows  the  following  stages:  (1)  The  common 
labor  of  all,  the  co-operation  of  homogeneous 
Wills  produces  it,  and  gives  to  it  its  essential 
character.  (2)  Hence  comes  its  divisibility  ac- 
cording to  the  number  of  Wills  concerned  in  pro- 
duction, each  Will  getting  its  share  in  proportion 
to    its    effort.     (3)  Each    Will   gets   its    share 


SOCIETY.  r.»5 

through  all,  through  the  Social  Whole,  whose 
act  is  this  division  and  assignment  of  shares. 
Society  in  its  simplicity  secures  this  quantitati\'e 
division  of  [)roducts,  the  laborers  being  all  ccju^d 
as  to  Will,  and  measured  by  a  common  standard. 

Now  the  result  is  that  the  Product  assigned  is 
a  realized  possession  of  each  Will,  being  so  ac- 
knowledged by  all  three  persons  co-operating. 
So  labor  ends  in  Property  just  by  the  preceding 
process,  which  tirst  shows  the  common  effort, 
then  the  division  by  which  the  common  Product 
is  individualized,  tinally  the  recognition  of  each 
j)()rtion  by  all.  The  Will,  living  and  active 
before,  is  now  realized,  inactive,  dead  in  the 
thing;  in  this  Condition,  it  is  taken  up  by  anew 
Will  (say  the  dealer  or  merchant),  who  gives  his 
effort  to  the  Product,  and  revivifies  it,  thereby 
making  it  the  Product  of  different  kinds  of  Wills, 
the  living  and  the  dead,  or  the  active  and  inactive 
Wills. 

2.  The  heterogeneous  many-willed  Product. 
The  Product  now  takes  character  from  the  two 
kinds  of  Wills  producing  it  and  becomes  hetero- 
geneous. Thus  the  great  twofold  separative  prin- 
ciple enters  production  and  calls  forth  the  chief 
conflicts  of  the  Social  System.  The  numy-willed 
Product  is  no  longer  homogeneous,  simply  quan- 
titative in  its  difference,  but  a  far  deeper,  a  quali- 
tative difference  has  been  projected  into  the  object 
l)y  the  two  Wills,  the  producing  and  the  produced, 


196  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  active  and  the  passive,  the  personal  and  the 
impersonal  (as  thing),  the  present  and  the  past 
AAlll.  In  other  words  Labor  and  Capital,  quies- 
cent and  implicit  in  the  homogeneous  Product, 
now  become  explicit. 

We  have  already  noted  in  the  preceding  process 
how  personal  effort  realizing  itself  becomes  an 
impersonal  possession  or  Property,  how  Labor 
through  its  own  inherent  nature  goes  over  into  a 
Product  which  becomes  Capital,  which  is,  so  to 
speak,  the  dead  hand  in  most  living  opera- 
tions of  the  business  world.  But  the  homo- 
geneous Product  in  the  instance  before  cited 
is  usually  heterogeneous.  The  owner  of  the 
seine  (in  the  foregoing  illustration)  is  likely 
to  be  the  fourth  partner,  the  inactive  one, 
along  with  the  three  fishermen,  the  active  part- 
ners, who  must  also  assign  to  him  his  share. 
But  how  great  a  share?  "What  common  standard 
can  be  found  for  measurins^  the  active  and  the 
inactive  Will?  And  further,  the  stream  or  the 
fish-pond  may  be  the  property  of  still  another 
person,  who  also  becomes  an  inactive  partner,  as 
the  owner  of  the  original  product  of  Nature. 
Thus  difference  enters  on  both  sides :  difference 
in  Capital,  which  may  be  the  transformed  imple- 
ment (the  seine)  or  the  transformed  bounty  of 
Nature  (the  stream)  ;  difference  also  in  the  active 
Wills  as  to  skill  and  strength.  So  on  the  one 
side  Capital  separates  into  Rent  for  the  natural 


SOCIETY.  197 

product,  and  Interest  on  the  value  of  the  trans- 
formed product,  which  is  here  the  tool;  on  the 
other  side  Labor  calls  forth  a  difference  in  re- 
ward, such  as  Wages  and  Profits.  Thus  the  het- 
erogeneous Product,  having  division  in  its  very 
being,  reproduces  this  division  indefinitely ;  the 
fundamental  one,  however,  is  the  division  into 
Labor  and  Capital,  the  living  and  the  dead  hand, 
the  personal  and  the  impersonal  factor  in  pro- 
duction. 

Still  the  two  are  but  sides  of  one  whole,  stages 
of  one  complete  process.  Capital  gives  to  Labor 
its  opportunity,  its  implement,  being  itself  an 
implement ;  on  the  other  hand  Labor  gives  to 
Capital  its  life,  revivifies  its  dead  or  passive  Will, 
and  makes  the  same  produce  again.  Without 
Capital  Labor  Avould  have  to  begin  over  again 
from  the  very  start,  it  would  have  to  make 
its  seine  before  it  could  catch  the  fish.  Yet  it 
nmst  have  fish  or  other  food  (which  is  Capital) 
before  it  can  even  make  the  seine.  Unless  the 
individual  Will  could  realize  itself  in  Property  or 
Capital,  and  thus  have  the  beginning  for  a  new 
activity,  the  human  being  would  have  to  consume 
immediately  what  he  produces,  and  so  would 
never  rise  beyond  the  stage  of  Nature,  or  of  tlie 
single-willed  Product  in  its  crudest  form.  Man 
would  have  to  seize  the  nut  or  berry,  and  devour 
it  in  order  to  get  tiie  pliysi<-al  })ower  to  seize  an- 
other nut  or  berry.     Pmt  in  the  developed  Social 


198  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Whole,  the  thing  must  be  given  before  it  can  be 
produced,  man  must  eat  his  dinner  before  he  can 
earn  his  dinner,  so  much  bread  the  plowman 
must  have  before  he  can  sow  the  wheat  for  his 
loaf.  All  this  is  merely  saying  that  he  must  have 
Capital  in  order  to  labor.  Thus  the  process  of 
Labor  is  to  unfold  into  its  own  presupposition ; 
that  which  it  produces  becomes  that  which  pro- 
duces it,  and  so  we  behold  it  in  its  process. 

This  heterogeneous  element  in  production  is 
what  socialism  seeks  to  eliminate.  The  dead 
hand  —  Capital  —  is  somehow  to  be  lopped  off,  as 
well  as  its  exploiter,  the  middleman.  Let  every 
individual  have  only  the  living  hand  of  labor,  but 
no  property  of  his  own.  From  the  Social  Whole 
he  is  to  receive  his  share  measured  out  accordintj 
to  the  quantity  of  his  labor,  which  is  or  is  to  be 
made  homogeneous.  The  scheme  of  socialism 
is,  therefore,  to  reduce  the  heterogeneous  many- 
w^illed  Product  into  a  homogeneous  one,  by  level- 
ing down  all  distinctions  of  Will  to  one  kind, 
thus  making  such  Product  easily  divisible  and 
distributable.  Hence  the  oft-noticed  tendency 
of  socialism  is  to  obliterate  all  special  skill  or 
superiority  or  the  desire  for  excellence,  as  this 
disturbs  the  homogeneity  of  labor,  or,  as  the 
socialists  say,  the  equality  of  man. 

The  great  transition  from  artisanship  to  indus- 
trialism, or  from  individual  production  to  soci:d, 
lies  in  the  social  movement  from  the  sinffle-wiHcd 


SOCIETY.  iJ)y 

Product  to  the  many-willed  heterogeneous  Prod- 
uct. Almost  any  utensil  before  us  may  be 
both,  a  bucket,  for  instance,  or  even  a  watch. 
This  last  stage,  also,  will  have  its  process. 

(1)  There  is  first  the  immediate  unity  of  the 
two  kinds  of  Will  when  the  laborer  and  the  capi- 
talist are  one  and  the  same  person,  as  is  often  the 
case.     The  farmer  who  cultivates  his  own  acres, 
and  uses  his  own  implements  has  in  an  undivided 
lump  wages  and  rent  and  also  interest;   so  has 
the    small  mechanic  who  owns  his  shop  in  the    ; 
village.   The  product  is,  however,  heterogeneous, 
yet  implicitly   so;   it  has  in  itself  the  different 
kinds  of  Wills,  though    not   divided  and  sepa- 
rately demanding  tribute.     This  is  the  independ-     i 
ent  workman,  as  near  as  he  can    be,  in  the  Social     \ 
Whole.     Such  is  usually  deemed  to  be  his  hap- 
piest condition. 

But  let  him  once  rent  a  piece  of  land  or  borrow 
some  money  for  improvements  ;   he  finds  that  he 
has  to  pay  wages  to  a  dead  hand,  which  indeed 
co-operates  with  him  if  he  energizes  it,  but  which 
demands  its  toll  with  unfailino^  reo;ularitv.     When 
the  product  of    his    effort  comes  in,  it  divides,    : 
one   part  staying  with  him  and  the  other  part    I 
leaving  him  forever  in  the  form  of  rent  or  inter- 
est or  both.     Here  then  we  must  consider  a  new    / 
phase  of  the  process. 

(2)  This  is  manifestly  the  separative  stage  of 
the  heterogeneous  Product,  the  main  line  of  cleav- 


200  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

age  being  the  two  different  kinds  of  Wills  which 
have  entered  into  its  composition.  Labor  and 
Capital  have  openly  separated,  their  division  has 
become  explicit,  real ;  even  though  they  co-oper- 
ate in  bringing  forth  the  Product,  they  at  once 
tear  it  asunder,  each  taking  a  share  and  going 
away  wath  it.  Labor  is  active,  the  producing 
Will;  Capital  is  stored  up,  the  produced  Will; 
the  latter  is  vitalized  by  the  former ;  the  former 
is  endowed  with  twofold  or  perchance  tenfold 
power  by  the  latter.  Which  is  the  more  impor- 
tant of  the  two?  What  share  of  the  Product 
ought  each  to  have?  A  question  not  easy  to  set- 
tle especially  when  left  to  the  parties  interested. 
Inevitably  there  will  be  conflict. 

One  fact  seems  pretty  w^ell  established :  with 
the  advance  of  Society  the  value  of  the  dead  Will 
continually  diminishes,  as  shown  by  the  decreas- 
ing rate  of  interest,  w^hile  the  value  of  the  living 
Will  (the  worth  of  man)  is  continually  rising,  as 
shown  by  the  general  increase  of  wages  amid  all 
fluctuations.  Yet  Labor  is  of  various  kinds,  hence 
the  difference  must  enter  it,  too. 

(3)  Labor,  accordingly,  separates  itself  also 
into  two  main  sorts,  yet  just  through  this  separa- 
tion it  is  joined  in  a  new  union  with  Capital. 
Going  to  a  farm  we  find  two  men  at  work  in  the 
field,  performing  the  same  kind  of  labor;  one  is 
"  the  hired  hand,"  the  other  is  the  owner  of  the 
land  and  of  the  implements  of  husbandry :  the  one 


SOCIETY.  201 

is  purely  laborer,  the  other  is  laborer  and  capital- 
ist, who  thus  unites  in  himself  the  extremes. 
Labor  and  Capital.  A  new  kind  of  division  of 
the  Product  results,  the  division  into  Wages  and 
Profits,  the  latter  being  some  combination  of 
Wages,  Rent  and  Interest.  Such  is  the  diiference 
between  the  two  laborers. 

Yet  we  must  notice  that  this  laboring  employer 
of  Labor,  by  virtue  of  his  double  position,  is  a 
mediator  between  Labor  and  Capital,  which  other- 
wise could  hardly  come  together  in  the  present 
instance.  So  Labor  and  Capital,  previously 
united  iumiediately  in  one  man,  are  now  also 
mediately  united  through  him,  and  the  separation 
for  the  time  beino;  is  harmonized.  The  living- 
"hired  hand"  clasps  through  him  the  "dead 
hand,"  and  both  are  made  to  co-operate  in  pro- 
duction with  little  or  no  jar  usuall3^ 

Thus  the  heterogeneous  many-willed  Product 
has  taken  its  first  and  easiest  course,  its  two  dif- 
ferent Wills  being  mediated  by  a  third  Will 
which  shares  in  both,  which  is  both  laborer  and 
capitalist.  Evidently  such  a  person  is  a  most 
important  development,  bearing  in  himself  tlic 
two  opposing  principles,  Labor  and  Capital,  and 
also  their  reconciliation.  So  important  is  such  a 
person  that  he  cannot  stop  in  his  development ;  he 
must  hear  the  call  to  mediate  not  one  or  two,  but 
many  laborers,  Avith  Capital,  which  also  comes  to 
him  and  begs  for  employment. 


202  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

But  with  such  an  evolution  he  is  changed  in 
character,  he  can  no  longer  be  a  "  hand  "  with 
other  *'  hands,"  he  has  to  drop  the  physical  side 
of  Labor,  and  thus  sever  his  direct  bond  of  con- 
nection with  the  laborer.  All  his  time  and  effort 
are  taken  up  with  his  special  gift,  which  has 
shown  itself  to  lie  in  his  mediatorial  function  be- 
tween Labor  and  Capital.  He  is  no  longer  the 
laborer,  but  the  employer  of  Labor;  no  longer 
the  capitalist  (or  he  need  not  be),  but  the  man- 
ager of  Capital ;  then  both  Labor  and  Capital  he 
directs  to  their  common  end,  to  the  exploitation 
of  great  enterprises.  This  is  the  new  man  who 
has  been  evolved  by  Societ3%  and  vvdio  must  next 
be  looked  at  in  his  place. 

3.  The  heterogeneous  many-ivilled  Product 
mediated.  This  mediation  is  accomplished  by 
the  new  middleman,  whom  we  shall  call  the  in- 
dustrial middleman,  though  he  has  a  variety  of 
names  corresponding  to  his  varied  relations.  The 
Product  has  in  it  a  society  of  Wills  which  have 
to  be  organized  and  socialized  in  order  to  make 
that  Product;  raw  material,  food  and  machinery 
must  be  furnished  them,  all  of  Avhich  is  the  part 
of  Capital;  then  the  Product  must  be  sold  in  the 
market.  What  is  the  power  first  concentrating 
in  itself  and  then  directing  these  three  elements 
which  are  often  recalcitrant?  This  is  the  indus- 
trial middlenum,  who  has  to  have  his  hand  on 
three    markets    at    the    same    time  —  the    labor- 


BOCIETY.  203 

market,  the  money-market  (Bank  or  Capital), 
and  the  product-market.  It  is  manifest  that  his 
situation  has  in  it  many  possibilities  of  conflict; 
these  united  elements  are  sure  to  fall  asunder  and 
to  assail  one  another  and  him  also. 

Already  we  have  seen  the  many-willed  Product 
calling  up  the  struggle  between  Labor  and  Cap- 
ital, two  of  the  preceding  elements.  But  these 
two  opposing  forms  of  Will  have  now  been  medi- 
ated by  a  new  Will  distinct  from  both,  yet 
controlling  both.  Here  rises  to  view  the  great 
administrator,  the  organizer  of  mighty  under- 
takings which  require  vast  Labor  and  Capital 
working  in  conjunction.  Directive  power  he 
must  have  in  a  supreme  degree,  uniting  the  two 
most  colossal  yet  antagonistic  agencies  of  Society, 
and  driving  them  like  a  span  of  refractory  horses 
to  the  goal  of  his  enterprise.  At  his  highest  he 
is  the  generalissimo  of  the  modern  industrial 
army,  the  man  of  brain  who  obtains  enormous 
rewards  for  his  service.  In  lower  grades  he  is 
the  contractor,  the  entrepreneur,  the  "  boss," 
whose  training-time  is  usually  the  period  when 
he  labored  with  his  laborers,  yet  hired  them,  too, 
on  his  own  account.  Thus  he  rises  from  the 
ranks  on  one  side,  yet  he  is  a  capitalist  on  the 
other,  both  elements  being  united  in  him 
innnediately.  His  next  step  is  he  frees  him- 
self from  both,  turning  and  commaiuling  bolli. 
Tims  lie  stands  forth    a    most    impoi'tant    ligurc 


204  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

in  the  modern  movement  of  the  Social 
Whole. 

It  was  said  that  he  is  the  mediator  between 
Labor  and  Capital,  and  he  is;  still,  the  old  con- 
flict is  bound  to  break  out  under  his  regime  in  a 
new  and  even  more  intense  form.  This  industrial 
middleman,  rising  out  of  Labor  and  knowing  it 
in  all  its  limitations,  will  be  sure  to  take  advan- 
tage of  his  knowledge.  In  fact  just  that  is  the 
reason  why  he  is  able  to  rise ;  he  possesses  talent, 
brain-power,  administrative  ability,  which  is 
wanting  to  the  rank  and  file  of  the  vast  army  of 
laborers,  who  feel  the  separation  and  possibh^  the 
wrong,  and  open  the  new  conflict.  Really,  this 
is  a  struggle  between  Brain  and  Brawn,  very  old 
indeed  (see  Sophocles'  Ajax  and  Shakespeare's 
TroUus  and  Cressida),  in  which  conflict 
Brawn  is  pretty  sure  to  be  worsted,  and 
if  it  be  not  worsted,  it  is  worse  off  than  if 
worsted. 

So  the  industrial  middleman  will  assert  himself, 
as  he  is  just  the  mediating  principle  without 
which  labor  is  laborless  and  money  is  moneyless. 
Still  in  this  process  of  mediating  the  Product, 
both  sides  will  learn  a  good  deal,  they  must 
come  to  a  new  consciousness  of  their  position  in 
the  Social  Whole. 

The  process  of  the  mediated  Product  of  many 
Wills  —  the  laborer  on  the  one  side,  the  capitalist 
on  the   other,  and   between   them  the  industrial 


SOCIETY.  205 

'  middleman  —  we  may  now  glance  at  it  in  its  sep- 
arate stages. 

(1)  At  first  the  many  Wills  work  together  in 
harmony  for  production.  The  vast  organism  of 
a  manufacturing  establishment  has  its  mass  of 
laborers,  its  directive  Will,  and  its  Capital.  All 
three  kinds  of  Wills  are  united  in  the  effort  of 
transformino^  a  given  material  into  the  Product 
which  we  have  called  mediated,  since  its  com- 
manding factor  is  the  industrial  middleman, 
whose  Will  has  joined,  vitalized  and  directed  the 
two  extremes.  Labor  and  Capital,  at  the  same 
time  looking  out  for  the  market  of  the  Product. 
But  Capital  retires  more  and  more  into  the  back- 
ground, in  fact,  it  becomes  less  and  less  valuable 
(judged  by  the  diminishing  rate  of  interest), 
while  the  industrial  middleman  becomes  more  and 
more  valuable  (judged  by  the  increasing  rate  of 
profits).  What  he  can  take  from  wages  is  his,  so 
there  begins  the  struggle  between  the  two  living 
Wills,  the  wage-laborer  and  the  industrial  nr* 
dleman. 

(2)  This  is  the  strongest,  deepest,  most  abid- 
ing conflict  of  the  present  stage  of  industrial 
Society,  which  may  be  stated  as  the  struggle  be- 
tween the  wage-laborer  and  the  industrial  middle- 
man, the  one  of  whom  has  muscle  chiefly  though 
directed  with  more  or  less  acquired  skill,  the 
other  of  whom  must  have  brain,  the  original  and 
originating  power,  though  this  is  given  in  differ- 


20(".  SOCIAL  INSTirUTIONS. 

cut  degrees.  So  we  Avitue:?s  a  tendency  in  Society 
to  reduce  the  wage-laborer  to  the  bare  necessities 
of  existence,  to  what  will  enable  liini  to  repro- 
duce his  da^^'s  toil  for  his  taskmaster.  This  fact 
has  been  enforced  with  great  energy  by  Marx 
and  his  school,  though  in  a  one-sided  way,  and, 
in  our  opinion,  with  one-sided  deductions. 

The  result  is  an  ernornious  accumulation  of 
Wealth  accompanied  by  hopeless  Poverty,  an 
ever-increasino"  luxury  alonsfside  of  social  misery. 
Thus  arises  somethings  more  than  a  struo^o-le  for 
supremacy,  it  is  a  struggle  for  life  or  rather  for 
an  improvement  in  life  which  deepens  into  a 
struggle  over  Society  itself.  Such  is  the  de- 
structive dualism  which  the  social  process  has 
evolved  out  of  itself,  but  Avhose  further  develop- 
ment belongs  in  a  different  connection. 

The  matter  now  to  be  noted  is  that  each  side 
has  been  in  a  training-school,  and  that  both 
through  conflict  have  learned  something  about 
each  and  all. 

(  3  )  The  total  Social  Order  gets  involved  in  the 
conflict  between  the  wage-earner  and  the  indus- 
trial middleman,  and  each  side  comes  to  recognize 
the  fact.  Thereb}^  it  has  found  out  its  place  and 
function  in  the  Social  Order.  This  mutual  recog- 
nition takes  place  between  Labor  and  Capital,  or 
between  the  laboring  multitude  and  their  media- 
tor, both  of  whom  must  recognize  themselves  as 
belonging  to  the  Social  Whole.     We  have  already 


SOCIETY.  207 

seen  that  Property  could  attain  its  validity  and 
perform  its  function  only  through  the  mutual 
recognition  of  the  possessor  and  the  purchaser; 
so  now  Society  itself  can  attain  its  purpose  and 
perform  its  function  only  through  the  mutual 
recognition  of  the  two  different  Wills,  Labor  and 
Capital,  including  their  mediator  who  is  specially, 
to  represent  and  recognize  the  Social  Whole, 
which  thereby  enters  every  Product. 

But  this  Product  is  clearly  a  new  one,  or  at 
least  is  to  be  seen  from  a  new  point  of  view;  it 
is  not  the  many- willed  Product,  but  the  all- willed 
Product,  with  which  fact  we  have  made  a  tran- 
sition out  of  the  present  into  a  new  sphere. 

Looking  back  a  moment  we  find  that  the  Social 
W^hole  thus  far  has  turned  on  the  willed  Product, 
the  object  into  which  man  puts  his  Will.  The 
single-willed  Product  has  evolved  the  mercantile 
middleman,  who  mediates  producer  and  con- 
sumer of  such  Products  at  first,  and,  finally,  of 
all  Products.  The  many-willed  Product  has 
evolved  the  industrial  middleman,  Avho  mediates 
Labor  and  Capital  and  directs  them  to  the  pro- 
duction of  the  many-willed  Product  which  is  no 
longer  simply  homogeneous,  but  heterogeneous, 
and  then  mediated. 

Moreover,  classes  of  Society  have  appeared 
corresponding  to  these  elements.  The  single- 
willed  Product  calls  forth  the  agriculturist,  the 
artisan,  the  tradesman  or  merchant ;  the    many- 


208  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

willed  Product  in  addition  creates  an  industrial 
class,  which  involves  production  of  raw  material 
(mining,  etc.),  the  transformation  of  such  mate- 
rial ( manufacturing ) ,  and  the  transportation  of 
matter  (railroad),  and  the  transmission  of  thought 
(telegraph,  etc.). 

Through  these  co-operating  social  instrument- 
alities, production  becomes  not  merely  single- 
willed  or  many-willed,  but  all-willed,  every 
Product  beino;  linked  into  the  total  social  chain 
more  or  less  directly. 

The  Social  Individual  frees  himself  from 
Nature's  necessity  through  the  Social  Whole. 
We  have  already  traced  how  man  produces  and 
reproduces  this  Social  Whole  by  his  activity' ; 
how  his  productive  genius  keeps  transforming  it 
by  new  inventions  which  wrest  fresh  spheres  of 
control  from  Nature ;  how  not  merely  his  physi- 
cal Wants,  but  his  deepest  Want,  namely,  his 
spiritual  need  of  transcending  limits,  is  here  sat- 
isfied. Thus  the  aspiration  for  freedom,  the 
mightiest  and  most  enduring  in  the  human  heart, 
finds  its  realization  in  one  direction  by  means  of 
the  Social  Whole. 

Man  himself  is  primarily  a  natural  product 
which  has  to  be  socialized  ere  he  can  be  free,  that 
is,  institutionally  free.  His  physical  Wants  are 
in  one  sense  animal  Wants,  yet  they  have  in  them 
the  ideal  propelling  end,  which  drives  him  to  con- 
struct    an     institution    for    their    gratification. 


SOCIETY.  209 

Hence  he  makes  an  all-willed  Product,  truly  the 
universal  Product,  made  for  all  and  by  all,  so  that 
even  through  the  most  individual  element  in  man, 
namely,  his  needs  and  wishes,  he  is  brought  to 
live  an  universal  life,  and  to  will  the  Free-Will  of 
all.  Such  is  the  side  of  freedom  in  the  Social 
Whole. 

That  there  is  another  side,  a  deeply  negative 
one,  to  this  social  movement  need  only  be  here 
indicated,  as  it  will  be  specially  developed  later. 
Man,  though  freed  from  the  external  might  of 
Nature  through  the  Social  Whole,  may  find  a 
new  tyrant  enslaving  him  just  in  this  Social 
Whole.  The  great  object  of  the  modern  institu- 
tional World,  especially  of  the  modern  State,  is 
to  compel  Society  to  perform  its  true  function, 
which  is  to  secure  within  its  sphere  of  action  the 
freedom  of  the  Social  Individual. 

Let  us  trace  the  career  of  the  middleman  in 
the  preceding  movement,  ere  he  passes  into  the 
following  stage  where  he  is  to  be  a  lead- 
ing character.  At  first  he  is  laborer,  owner 
(capitalist)  and  middleman  for  himself  —  all  in 
one  (the  village  artisan  or  small  farmer  who 
does  his  own  work).  Then  he  is  laborer  and 
owner,  and  also  middleman  for  another,  his  hired 
man ;  thus  the  middleman  has  become  partially 
explicit.  Thirdly,  he  becomes  middleman  com- 
pletely, mediating  Labor  on  one  side.  Capital  on 
the  other,  and  also  marketing  their  P-roduct. 

14 


210  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

But  this  heterogeneous  many-willed  Product, 
though  now  mediated,  has  fermenting  within  it 
the  most  powerful  explosive  elements  of  the  mod- 
ern world.  Production  with  its  concentration, 
division  of  labor,  and  finally  with  its  machinery, 
gorges  the  market  beyond  all  power  of  consump- 
tion; the  middlemen  fall  into  furious  competi- 
tion with  one  another,  which  is  accompanied  by 
all  sorts  of  economic  throat-cutting,  and  throws 
the  entire  Social  Body  into  convulsions.  Thus 
it  is  found  that  Production  involves  all  Society, 
is  at  bottom  an  all-willed  act. 

III.  The  All-Willed  Product.  — We  are 
now  to  unfold  fully  the  fact  that  what  the 
producer  makes  is  not  simply  a  one-willed  Prod- 
uct, though  it  be  this,  too;  not  simply  a  many- 
willed  Product,  though  it  be  this,  too;  but,  ulti- 
mately, an  all- willed  Product.  The  universal 
Product  and  the  Product  in  its  universality  we 
are  called  on  to  consider,  and  also  their  interaction  ; 
that  is,  we  must  now  take  into  view  the  Social 
Individual,  the  Social  Whole,  and  their  process 
with  its  mediation. 

At  the  start,  man  is  an  all-willed  Product,  and 
thereby  becomes  a  member  of  the  Social  Order, 
a  Social  Individual,  He  finds  that  all  he  gets  he 
has  to  get  through  the  Social  Whole,  though  at 
first  he  be  quite  unconscious  of  the  fact.  So  we 
may  say  the  Social  Whole  produces  him,  deter- 
mines him,  though  in  doing  so  it  has  a  struggle 


SOCIETY.  211 

with  another  determinant,  namely,  Nature.  On 
the  other  hand,  man  produces,  or,  rather,  repro- 
duces the  Social  Whole ;  he  must  determine  his 
determinant,  reproduce  through  his  own  activity 
his  reproducer.  His  Wants  invoke  the  Social 
Whole  for  satisfaction,  his  activity  must  aid  in 
preserving  and  re-creating  that  Social  Whole. 
Finally,  as  the  Social  Individual  and  the  Social 
Whole  engender  or  inherit  a  conflict,  there  rises 
a  mediating  third  principle,  which  we  shall  like- 
wise have  to  consider  an  all-willed  Product. 

Thus  we  witness  in  the  present  sphere  three 
all-willed  Products,  or  three  forms  which  have 
this  common  characteristic,  though  in  other  re- 
spects they  be  quite  different.  They  are  the 
subjective  all-willed  Product,  the  social  Indi- 
vidual; the  objective  all-willed  Product,  the 
Social  Whole;  and  the  third  all-willed  Product, 
the  new  middleman.  The  first  unfolds  through 
the  second  into  the  third ;  then  all  three  are  in  a 
process  with  each  other. 

The  aim  of  the  total  movement  is  toward  free- 
dom, toward  the  liberation  of  man  from  the 
domination  of  Nature  pure  and  simple.  As  a 
mere  physical  being  he  is  subject  to  an  outer 
world  ruling  him  through  his  Wants ;  that  outer 
world  he  must  transform,  converting  it  into  an 
implement  of  freedom,  whereby,  it  becomes  a 
social  world,  through  which  his  Wants  are  satis- 
fied.    Yet  this  social  world  can  become  tyrannical 


212  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

also,  as  we  shall  see  in  the  course  of  the  following 
development. 

The  industrial  middleman  of  the  last  stage  is 
now  seen  vanishing  into  the  social  or  all- willed 
middleman,  who  is,  however,  one-willed  also, 
having  one-man  power ;  monocratic  we  may  call 
him.  He  has  been  generated  by  the  Social 
Whole  in  order  to  mediate  the  conflicts  which 
have  sprung  up  in  the  domain  and  under  the  rule 
of  the  industrial  middleman,  who  is  now  reduced 
to  the  ranks  of  the  wage-earners,  though  usually 
he  is  given  a  high  salary  as  manager  or  repre- 
sentative of  the  new  universal  middleman  (mo- 
nocratic), either  in  the  name  of  an  individual 
or  a  company  or  both.  Thus  the  simple  Product 
of  the  laborer  or  workman  is  becoming  organi- 
cally all- willed,  being  now  taken  into  and  manipu- 
lated by  the  organized  Social  Whole,  or  a  large 
part  thereof.  Such  is  the  new  phenomenal  birth 
of  the  time,  the  monopolist  with  his  trust  or 
combination,  advancing  well  toward  the  complete 
socialization  of  all  Industry,  with  a  still  vaster 
outlook  into  the  future. 

The  following  development  will  be  considered 
in  its  three  stages:  first,  the  all-willed  Product 
as  Social  Individual;  second,  the  all-willed  Prod- 
uct as  Social  Whole ;  third,  the  all-willed  Product 
as  Social  Middleman.  The  latter  is  himself  a 
Product,  and  all-willed,  yet  mediating  the  all- 
willed  Product  of  labor,  or  showing  that  such  is 


SOCIETY.  213 

the     end     toward     which     social     evolution     is 
moving. 

1.  The  all-willed  Product  as  Social  Individ- 
ual. That  is,  the  human  being  is  to  be  recog- 
nized as  an  all-willed  Product,  he  is  not  merely 
the  child  of  his  parents,  but  of  his  age,  nation, 
race,  of  civilization ;  it  is  the  Social  Order  which 
produces  him  in  everything  except  his  animality. 
Man  is  to  be  first  regarded  as  a  Product  of  the 
Social  Whole  immediately  and  unconsciously; 
he  is  born  into  Society  which  at  once  determines 
him,  bringing  to  him  through  the  parent  what 
may  be  needful  for  him  physically  as  well  as 
mentally  or  morally.  The  infantile  state  of  de- 
pendence lasts  longer  than  that  of  any  other  ani- 
mal; its  wants  cannot  be  supplied  from  Nature 
directly,  but  mediately  through  Society,  which 
gives  to  the  child  his  education,  confirms  his 
property,  and  renders  possible  his  future  career. 
We  may  set  down  some  of  these  matters  in  order. 

(1)  His  Wants  are,  in  part  at  least,  deter- 
mined by  the  Social  Whole,  or  transformed  by  it; 
he  has  many  Wants  which  no  animal  has,  and 
what  he  has  in  common  with  the  animal  are 
changed.  Artificial  Wants  are  those  made  by 
Society  or  transformed  from  Nature,  they  begin 
with  the  baby's  dress,  and  continue  through  life. 

(2)  His  Will  (effort,  activity)  is  primarily 
determined  by  the  Social  AVhole,  or  is  directed 
by  it.     As  a  child  he  is  trained  to  work,  which 


214  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

means  that  he  must  perform  a  task  given  by  the 
Social  Whole,  though  this  task  be  assigned  first 
by  the  parent.  In  the  kindergarden  already,  the 
child  through  play  is  made  to  earn  what  he  re- 
ceives even  in  the  way  of  food,  and  it  is  the  Social 
Order  which  gives  him  the  kindergarden  and 
other  means  of  education. 

(3)  His  recompense  for  activity  comes  through 
the  Social  Whole,  which  furnishes  him  with 
food,  raiment,  and  shelter,  and  possibly  much 
more.  Thus  it  is  a  kind  of  Home  to  him  or  sec- 
ond mother,  who  gives  him  what  he  needs,  but 
always  requires  of  him  his  task,  his  labor. 

Thus  we  may  see  the  Social  Whole  always  at 
work,  quite  secretly  perhaps,  in  determining  and 
moulding  the  individual  from  his  birth.  From 
this  point  of  view  man  is  the  all-willed  Product ; 
it  is  the  Social  Whole  which  is  forming  him,  the 
Social  Whole  being  practically  the  Will  of  all. 
In  fact  this  is  what  has  from  the  beginning  so- 
cialized  the  individual,  who  is  otherwise  a  mere 
natural  Product,  which  it  is  the  function  of 
Society  to  transform. 

The  present  is,  then,  the  stage  of  the  deter- 
mination of  the  Social  Individual ;  even  the  but- 
ton on  his  coat  is  made  for  him  by  many  hands 
co-operating  in  the  Social  Whole.  But  he  in  his 
turn  must  be  one  of  these  co-operating  factors ; 
what  has  determined  him  he  now  determines ;  he 
separates  from  himself  and  projects  out  of  him- 


SOCIETY.  216 

self  just  that  Social  Whole  which  came  to  him 
from  the  outside. 

2.  The  all-willed  Product  as  the  Social 
Whole.  —  This  is  manifestly  the  separative  or 
externalizing  act  of  the  Ego,  and  hence  is  the 
second  stage  of  the  present  process.  The  Social 
Individual  (or  Ego)  divides  from  himself  that 
which  has  produced  him  socially,  and  objectifies 
the  same  in  the  Social  Institution ;  through  his 
labor  he  is  perpetually  reproducing  this  Institu- 
tion as  an  existent  object,  which  is  an  all-willed 
Product,  since  every  Social  Individual  takes  part 
in  reproducing  it.  All  labor,  therefore,  has  in  it 
an  institutional  element,  and,  as  the  effort  of  the 
individual  Will,  is  truly  ethical. 

Such  is  the  fortress  which  the  Social  Individual 
builds  to  protect  himself  against  the  might  of 
external  Nature.  Truly  it  is  a  kind  of  universal 
shelter,  or  home,  which,  however,  must  be  in- 
cessantly renewed.  Not  only  a  home,  but  also  a 
body  it  is ;  and  still  more  than  a  body  we  must 
deem  it,  namely,  an  Institution.  Many  close 
analogies  to  the  human  organism  Society  shows, 
but  the  main  distinctive  point  is  left  out  if  it  be 
treated  in  a  purely  biological  way.  Similarity 
there  is  between  tlie  Human  Body  and  tlie  Social 
Body,  but  also  a  decided  contrast. 

(1)  The  Social  Individual  is  to  furnish  to  the 
Social  Whole  what  primarily  sustains  it,  namely 
his  Labor,  which  is  of  course  his  effort,  his  Will. 


216  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Labor  is  the  universal  food  of  the  Social  Body. 
The  Products  of  every  individual  Will  have  to 
pass  through  it  in  order  to  be  socialized,  and  it 
is  itself  the  Product  of  all  these  Wills  — just  that 
Product  whose  function  is  to  give  back  to  each 
AYill  its  own  and  in  the  form  which  it  desires. 
Wherein  we  recognize  again  the  thought  of  Will 
actualized,  or  the  Institution. 

Illustrating  this  thought  by  analogy  we  can  say 
that  the  laborer  (or  the  Social  Individual)  has  to 
satisfy  not  merely  his  own  single  Body  but  the 
universal  Body,  which  must  be  active  before  his 
individual  Wants  can  be  satisfied.  So  not  merely 
his  own  Body  but  the  universal  Body,  having 
Want,  must  have  food;  the  action  is  reciprocal, 
each  is  satisfied  through  the  other.  Each  is  a 
Product,  yea,  an  all-willed  Product,  though  in 
quite  opposite  ways.  The  Social  Individual  is  an 
all-willed  Product  through  the  Social  Institution ; 
the  Social  Institution  is  an  all-wiUed  Product 
through  the  Social  Individual,  though  he  pro- 
duces at  first  a  single-willed  Product.  For  all 
individual  workers  who  make  such  Products  must 
likewise  be  mediated  by  the  Social  Whole. 

When  it  comes  to  the  many-willed  Product,  at 
once  a  new  process  begins.  When  many  Wills 
(or  Persons)  are  united  in  producing  the  separate 
parts  of  the  article  which  is  to  be  produced,  the 
power  of  production  is  increased  greatly,  which 
power  is  still  further  increased  by  incoming  ma- 


SOCIETY.  217 

chineiy.  This  vast  increment  of  production  will 
place  new  duties  upon  the  industrial  middleman 
who  has  to  market  all  these  commodities ;  from 
this  fact  will  arise  a  new.  movement  in  the  ranks 
of  the  middlemen  themselves,  whereof  something 
will  be  unfolded  later  in  its  proper  place. 

Just  now,  however,  we  wish  to  set  forth,  first, 
that  all  are  to  give  their  individual  labor  to  the 
Social  Whole,  and  be  mediated  socially  by  it, 
thus  making  it  an  all-willed  Product;  secondly, 
that  all  are  to  give  their  associated  labor  to  the 
Social  Whole,  and  be  mediated  socially  by  it, 
thus  makino;  it  an  all-willed  Product.  Individual 
labor  brings  forth  the  object  which  we  have 
called  single-willed ;  but  associated  labor  of  many 
AYills  in  the  object  produced  is  what  we  are  next 
to  consider,  as  it  introduces  a  new  division  in 
addition  to  the  former  division  into  Labor  and 
Capital. 

(2)  This  is  the  division  of  Labor.  The  Social 
Individual  specializes  himself  in  production,  he 
creates  new  demands  or  new  Wants  by  his  in- 
ventions which  are  in  some  form  a  fresh  conquest 
of  Nature,  and  hence  a  further  liberation.  The 
invention,  for  instance,  of  the  reaping-machine, 
was  an  overcoming  of  a  great  physical  resistance, 
and  thereby  created  a  new  Want,  which,  however, 
set  aside  or  superannuated  many  former  Wants 
connected  with  harvesting.  That  is,  the  farmer 
now  needs  a  reaping-machine,  but  needs  no  longer 


218  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

a  sickle  or  a  raker  and  binder,  or  a  small  army  of 
harvesters,  in  order  to  put  up  his  crop.  Note  the 
significant  fact  that  in  language  the  words  reaper, 
rakei\  hinder,  pass  from  the  man  to  the  machine. 

The  specialization  of  Labor  is  inherent  in  the 
Ego  as  Will,  whose  psychical  process  is  to  divide 
within  itself  and  then  transcend  its  division. 
Hence  Labor  becomes  more  effective  in  quantity 
and  quality  in  proportion  as  it  specializes  itself. 
Finally,  the  Social  Individual  produces  the  ma- 
chine to  take  his  place  and  do  his  work;  he 
turns  the  powers  of  Nature  against  Nature,  and 
subjects  her  to  himself,  he  thereby  getting  the 
mastery. 

Thus  the  Social  Individual  puts  the  division 
of  Labor  into  the  Social  Whole  (of  which  it  be- 
comes an  important  element),  by  means  of  the 
heterogeneous  many-willed  Product,  which  is 
next  to  be  willed  not  simply  by  many  but  by  all. 
That  is,  the  Social  Whole  is  an  all-willed  Product 
now  through  the  associated  labor  of  all  in  the 
manufactured  Product,  which  thereby  becomes 
the  image  or  rather  the  embodied  form  of  the 
Social  Whole,  the  latter  being  also  a  Product  of 
the  division  of  labor,  willing  and  enforcing  the 
same  through  its  mediation. 

With  this  last  word  appears  a  new  factor, 
namely  the  middleman  who  performs  the  medi- 
ating act  of  the  Social  Whole,  of  which  he  is, 
therefore,  an  integral  clement.     Alreadv  we  have 


80CJETT.  219 

seen  him  generated  in  the  process  of  the  many- 
willed  Product  as  the  industrial  middleman,  in 
which  he  was  the  mediating  principle  between 
Labor,  Capital,  and  Market.  The  Social  Whole 
must,  therefore,  include  him  in  the  movement  of 
itself  as  an  all-willed  Product.  Moreover  he  is 
the  one  who  harmonizes  the  inherent  division  and 
conflict  which  lie  naturally  in  the  division  of 
Labor,  employing  it  for  increased  production 
and  giving  to  it  its  purpose  in  the  development  of 
the  Social  Whole,  as  well  as  looking  out  for  the 
increased  distribution  of  the  increased  production. 

(3)  Accordingly  the  all- willed  Product  as  the 
Social  Whole  has  in  itself  the  mediation  of  the 
foregoing  division  of  Labor  in  production,  the 
mediation  of  the  Wills  co-operating  in  the  manu- 
factured Product  or  any  other  kind  of  Product, 
which  mediation  is  the  work  or  the  Product  of 
the  industrial  middleman,  who  functions  herein 
the  Social  Whole.  Now  this  mediating  Will  (of 
the  middleman)  also  produces,  its  Product  being 
just  this  mediation  of  the  single-willed  and  many- 
willed  Products  before  mentioned,  making  them 
over  into  all- willed  or  truly  social  Products. 

In  such  fashion  the  many-v\41led  heterogeneous 
Product,  made  by  a  number  of  associated  Wills 
with  division  of  Labor,  is  elevated  into  an  all- 
willed  Product  through  the  Social  Whole  repre- 
sented and  functioned  by  the  industrial  middleman. 
Thus  it  is  socialized,  becoming  all-willed  throiiuli 


220  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Society  which  is  itself  an  all- willed  Product  whose 
end  is  to  make  the  single-willed  and  the  many- 
willed  Product  all- willed.  Each  individual  Will 
in  its  tiniest  productive  effort  is  thus  confirmed 
by  the  Social  Will,  and  mediated  through  it  by 
its  mediating  Will,  namely  the  middleman.  The 
latter,  in  developing  a  market  for  increased  pro- 
duction, must  rely  on  increased  consumption. 

The  Social  Individual  has  a  tendency  to  univer- 
salize himself  in  consumption,  whereas  he  espe- 
cializes  himself  in  production.  He  meets  the  new 
supply  with  the  new  demand,  for  the  new  supply 
furnishes  him  with  some  fresh  power  over  Nature. 
Hence  his  desire  for  freedom  leads  him  to  look 
after  the  new  device  or  invention,  at  least  that  is 
the  spirit  in  countries  which  are  new  and  free. 
Enormous  productivity  in  inventions  results  from 
the  ready  consumption  of  those  articles  which 
are  a  genuine  advance  towards  freedom.  It 
should  never  be  forgotten,  however,  that  as  we 
become  more  independent  of  Nature  through  ma- 
chinery, we  are  becoming  more  dependent  on  the 
Social  Whole,  so  that  there  is  still  dependence. 

Less  and  less  is  the  tendency  for  individual 
man  to  produce  what  he  consumes,  as  this  is  al- 
ways increasing  in  variety  and  complexity.  In 
fact,  the  circle  of  his  production  is  becoming 
narrower,  while  the  circle  of  his  consumption  is 
widening,  whereby  his  dependence  on  the  Social 
Whole  is  more  complete.     Thus  the  Social  In- 


SOCIETY.  221 

dividual  is  halved  by  the  Social  Whole  into  two 
opposite  tendencies :  more  special  in  his  work  or 
vocation,  more  universal  in  his  wants  and  their 
satisfaction.  Both  sides,  however  divergent,  are 
united  by  the  Social  Whole  through  its  middleman. 

Such  is  the  movement  toward  the  absolute 
socialization  of  man,  in  which  we  may  well  see 
the  development  into  a  completer  freedom. 
Really  it  is  the  social  unfolding  of  the  individual 
which  brings  about  the  division  of  Labor,  whose 
end  is  always  something  better,  i.  e.,  perfection. 
The  Ego  confines  its  work  to  the  one  narrow  field 
and  perfects  it  in  excellence  and  rapidity  of  pro- 
duction, and  perchance  in  other  ways.  To  be 
sure  there  is  a  drawback  to  this  narrowing  life, 
which  the  Social  Whole  must  seek  to  remedy. 

The  primitive  man  produces  what  he  needs, 
and  consumes  what  he  produces,  for  the  most 
part ;  thus  he  is  a  self-sufficient  being  in  contrast 
to  the  Social  Individual,  since  he  bears  in  him- 
self quite  the  total  process  of  the  Social  Whole. 
But  his  destiny  is  to  throw  this  out  of  himself, 
to  make  it  objective,  whereby  it  becomes  Will 
actualized,  an  Institution,  which  is  the  comple- 
tion and  fulfillment  of  his  selfhood. 

Recapitulating  the  movement  under  the  head 
of  The  all-willed  Product  as  tJie  Social  IVIiole, 
we  can  conceive  it  summarily  as  follows.  First, 
the  individual  labor  of  all  (which  is  their  Will) 
producing  the    single-willed  Product,  calls  forth 


222  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  Social  "Whole  to  mediate  the  same.  Second, 
the  collective  or  social  labor  of  all  (  which  is  their 
Will)  producing  the  many-willed  Product  calls 
forth  the  Social  Whole  to  mediate  the  same. 
Third,  this  Social  Whole,  mediating  the  labor 
of  all  calls  forth  the  individual  mediator,  the 
middleman,  who  is  to  function  the  Social  Whole 
as  the  all-willed  Product  which  has  to  make  valid 
socially  all  products  of  all  Wills. 

Such  is  the  result :  the  Social  Whole  is  an  all- 
willed  Product  as  well  as  the  Social  Individual, 
with  whom  we  started.  But  at  the  same  time 
another  result  has  appeared  :  it  is  the  middleman 
who  is  a  Social  Individual,  yet  whose  function  is 
to  perform  the  function  of  the  Social  Whole. 
Thus  he  has  both  elements  in  him ;  he  is  an  all- 
willed  Product  from  both  directions,  being  medi- 
ated by  the  Social  Whole  which  he  mediates 
through  and  for  all.      Still  he  is  a  single  Will. 

He  too  must  have  his  process,  which  springs 
from  his  double,  or  indeed  triple  character. 
This  we  shall  consider  next. 

3.  The  aJl-wlUed  Product  as  Social  Middle- 
man. So  we  shall  name  him  at  present,  since 
he  is  the  truly  social,  that  is,  universal  middle- 
man, and  since  ideally  he  is  to  mediate  all  society 
and  free  it  from  inner  conflict.  That  such  a  state 
of  thinojs  is  not  vet  realized  is,  of  course,  maui- 
fest,  but  the  tendency  to  its  realization  is  every- 
where evident  in  the  social  movements  of  to-dav. 


SOCIETY.  22,^ 

Here  we  shall  employ  another  word  which 
seems  needful,  and  which  has  already  been  sua- 
gested  —  the  word  monocratic,  which  in  our 
usage  means  one-willed,  yet  through  all  Wills. 
It  is  one-man  power,  yet  mediated  by  all  men. 
The  United  States  Government  is  a  monocracy, 
a  one-willed  Institution,  yet  likewise  an  all-willed 
Institution,  a  democracy,  and  each  works  through 
and  is  mediated  by  the  other.  A  monocracy  is 
different  from  a  monarchy  or  an  autocrac}^  which 
has  no  such  mediation  through  all,  or  has  it  im- 
perfectly. Monocracy  and  Democracy  go  to- 
gether and  cannot  be  separated  without  despot- 
ism on  one  side  or  chaos  on  the  other.  Each 
must  finally  be  through  the  other. 

Society,  or  the  Industrial  Order,  is  going  and 
must  go  the  same  way  as  the  State.  It  will  have 
its  monocratic  middleman  and  is  now  generating 
him,  at  the  same  time  it  must  make  him  perform 
his  duty  to  all.  He  is  essentially  one-willed  yet 
he  is  through  and  for  all  Wills,  and  hence  he  is 
called  likewise  an  all-willed  Product. 

We  have  just  seen  the  unfolding  of  two  social 
elements,  the  Social  Individual  and  the  Social 
Whole  as  all-willed  Products.  Moreover,  we 
have  likewise  seen  the  Social  Whole  as  an  all- 
willed  Product  returning  and  producing  the  Social 
Individual,  who  is  no  longer  simply  the  person 
whose  wants  are  determined  by  and  satisfied  by 
the  Social  Whole.     This  is  a  new  Social  Individ- 


224  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ual,  the  one  who  represents  the  Social  Whole  in 
its  capacity  of  supplj-ing  the  wants  of  the  first  or 
immediate  Social  Individual.  Him  we  have  al- 
ready called  the  middleman,  and  have  seen  him 
arising  in  the  process  of  social  development,  as 
mercantile  and  as  industrial,  when  we  were  con- 
sidering the  single-willed  Product  and  the  many- 
willed  Product.  But  now  he  is  to  appear  to  us 
in  a  new  light  and  in  a  new  development ;  he  is  to 
be  seen  as  universal  or  as  the  all-willed  Product, 
culminating  in  what  we  have  just  called  the 
monocratic  middleman. 

Here  we  come  upon  the  thought  of  Monopoly 
which  has  in  the  present  and  in  all  times  pla^^ed 
such  an  important  part  in  the  history  of  Society. 
The  truth  is  the  middleman  is  necessarily  a 
monopolist  in  the  beginning  and  at  the  end ;  he 
Avithin  limits  sets  the  price  upon  the  article  bought 
and  sold;  undoubtedly  these  limits  vary  much 
with  the  circumstances.  V>^hen  he  says  to  the 
purchaser,  "  So  much  you  must  pay  for  this  arti- 
cle," he  is  exercising  one-man  power  in  this  rela- 
tion. On  the  other  hand  the  purchaser  may  be 
able  to  refuse  to  give  the  price,  or  he  may  not, 
his  wants  compelling  him. 

The  fixing  of  the  price  by  one  Will  for  another 
Will  needing  the  article  is  the  basic  act  of  all 
Monopoly  and  is  not  necessarily  bad.  The  odious 
side  of  Monopoly  begins  when  ad\'antage  is  taken 
of  the  needs  of  the  consumer  to  extort  an  unjustly 


SOCIETY.  225 

high  price.  What  constitutes  an  unjustly  high 
price,  is  a  complicated  question  ;  of  its  existence, 
however,  there  can  be  no  doubt,  and  through  it 
can  arise  gross  social  tyranny  of  one  Will  over 
other  Wills.  Still  the  primary  trade-act  must  be 
considered  to  be  monopolistic,  and  in  the  nature 
of  the  case  cannot  help  being  so.  This  we  may, 
therefore,  call  Natural  Monopoly,  which  is  the 
psychical  beginning  of  the  middleman. 

This  middleman,  as  we  see  by  his  genesis,  is  a 
single  Will  endowed  with  the  power  of  the  Social 
Whole  which  is  all-willed  in  a  social  sense ;  he 
functions  the  social  Totality,  w^hich  is  to  receive, 
transform,  and  distribute  the  social  product  for 
the  satisfaction  of  social  wants.  He  is  a  one- 
willed  manufacturer,  buyer  and  seller  (monopolos) , 
who  is  socially  all-willed;  the  conjunction  of 
these  two  elements  makes  him  a  monopolist,  who 
can  become  a  benefactor  or  a  despot,  socially. 

Thus  Society  evolves  by  its  own  inner  process 
the  mediating  Individual,  or  middleman,  as  an  all- 
willed  Product,  whose  function  is  to  perform  the 
functions  of  the  Social  Whole.  He  is  the  cre^i- 
ture  of  Society,  whose  object  is  to  keep  creating 
Society  in  its  social  movement ;  he  is  the  Social 
Individual  as  produced  by  and  producing  the 
Social  Whole ;  he  is  the  mediating  Social  Indi- 
vidual for  the  immediate  Social  Individual  wuth 
his  products  and  his  wants. 

In  the  present  field  we  can  observe  the  general 

15 


226  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

process  to  be  as  follows :  First,  from  Nature  and 
from  the  Ego  itself  will  come  the  primal  sugges- 
tion of  the  monocratic  middleman  or  the  mon- 
opolist. Secondly,  the  mercantile  and  especially 
the  industrial  middleman,  through  his  own  "Will 
transforming  the  many-wdlled  Product  into  his 
own  individual  property  (single- willed  again), 
calls  forth  many  competing  Wills  as  middle- 
men —  Competition,  or  the  separative  stage. 
Thirdly,  this  new  man3^-willed  Product,  namely, 
the  Social  Whole  in  its  competitive  conflict,  is 
brought  back  to  unity  by  a  new  middleman  (social, 
universal,  monocratic ) . 

(1)  We  shall  first  consider  Natural  Monopoly, 
which  has  its  psychical  starting-point  in  the  mid- 
dleman who  has  by  Nature  his  mediating  power 
as  distinct  from  other  Social  Individuals.  The 
original  barterer  is  naturalhj  what  he  is,  having 
a  certain  native  talent  or  bent  for  making  himself 
the  mediator  of  the  Social  Whole  in  a  primitive 
state  of  society.  This  native  ability  or  inclina- 
tion for  his  special  work  is  what  primarily  selects 
the  middleman  and  gives  him  a  Natural  Monop- 
oly of  business  power  which  may  make  him  the 
master  of  a  sphere  small,  great  or  the  greatest. 

Again,  physical  Nature  places  limits  which 
render  Monopoly  possible,  limits  of  locality,  time, 
and  materials.  This  is,  also.  Natural  Monopoly, 
springing  from  Nature  who  specializes  herself  in 
the  outer  as  well  as  the  inner  world.     On  one 


SOCIETY.  227 

side  of  a  ^uiall  mountain  she  produces  a  grape 
from  which  is  expressed  the  finest  wine  in  the 
world ;  the  owner  of  tliose  few  acres  has  a  Na- 
tural Monopoly  of  that  wine.  Tlie  best  anthracite 
coal  in  the  United  States  is  found  in  a  limited 
portion  of  Pennsylvania,  so  that  it  has  formed 
the  basis  of  a  Natural  Monopoly.  Still  we  are 
to  note  that  to  seize  and  exploit  such  a  Natural 
Monopoly  requires  the  individual  with  the  special 
talent,  Avhich  is  itself  his  primal  Natural  Monop- 
oly. External  Nature,  howeve?  specialized,  can 
only  be  monopolized  by  a  mental  Monopoly  fitted 
for  the  enterprise. 

On  the  other  hand  there  has  probably  never 
yet  existed  an  absolute  Monopoly  anywhere ;  all 
Monopolies  have  hitherto  shown  themselves  par- 
tial, limited,  finite.  If  the  price  of  wheat  is 
forced  up  by  a  Monopoly,  other  grains  will  be 
substituted,  and  thus  it  is  with  all  necessaries  as 
products.  The  ordinary  Avants  of  man  can  be 
satisfied  in  different  ways  and  by  different  arti- 
cles. Of  course  an  absolute  Monopoly  can  be 
conceived,  for  instance  that  of  land,  which  is 
limited  on  the  globe. 

The  Social  Whole  in  one  phase  of  its  move- 
ment has  a  tendency  to  break  up  the  one  Monopoly 
into  many.  As  we  have  seen,  it  produces  the 
middleman  who  is  to  function  it ;  thus  it  has  the 
power  of  endowing  the  individual  with  its  medi- 
ating principle.    Not  only  one  but  many  individuals 


228  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

it  can  so  empower ;  in  this  way  a  new  force  be- 
ofins  to  enter  the  social  field :  the  strugfofle  of 
these  many  middlemen  with  one  another.  In 
such  a  conjuncture  the  one  will  seek  to  exclude 
the  rest  by  a  higher  authority  which  he  invokes, 
the  law. 

So  we  have  a  new  kind  of  Monopoh',  originated 
and  protected  by  the  State.  Some  of  these 
ought  to  be,  such  as  patents  and  copyrights; 
others  ought  not.  A  protective  tariff  is  a  legal 
Monopoly  which  may  be  justifiable  at  one  time 
and  not  at  another.  Then  comes  the  counter- 
stroke:  the  State  through  its  law  assails  and 
breaks  down  Monopoly  as  contrary  to  individual 
freedom  under  the  name  of  public  interest.  Again 
the  Social  Whole  is  left  free  for  the  middleman. 

Thus  we  have  traced  the  general  process  of 
Monopoly,  which  starts  as  the  Natural  Monopoly 
of  the  one  middleman,  who  is  then  multiplied  by 
the  Social  Whole  into  many  middlemen  for  its 
ends ;  finally  the  one  middleman  again  gets  con- 
trol over  this  Social  Whole  through  the  State. 
As  this  violates  the  freedom  of  the  individual  as 
well  as  the  Social  Whole,  the  State  will  in  time 
abrogate  its  own  law  or  regulation,  leaving  the 
Social  Whole  and  the  middleman  in  free  activity 
with  each  other. 

The  middleman  being  free  in  his  activity,  will 
begin  to  exploit  his  side  enormously ;  as  indus- 
trial, lie  will  increase  production  through  concen- 


SOCIETY.  229 

tration  of  effort  and  through  division  of  labor  as 
well  as  through  machinery.  The  result  will  be 
that  he  will  not  be  able  to  market  what  he  pro- 
duces, as  production  has  outrun  consumption. 
Then  come  the  fall  of  prices  and  the  bitter  com- 
petition among  the  middlemen  themselves  for  the 
market,  in  which  conflict  all  Society  soon  gets  in- 
volved, showing  that  production  is  ultimately  all- 
willed,  is  through  all  and  for  all. 

(2)  Such  is  the  outcome  of  Competition,  in 
which  a  number  of  middlemen  seek  to  perform 
the  function  of  social  mediation  for  the  Social 
"Whole  in  a  branch  of  business  more  or  less  lim- 
ited. The  Social  Whole  call's  forth  this  multi- 
plicity, and  thus  divides  up  the  single  Monopoly 
among  many  middlemen,  each  of  whom  tries  to 
be  the  sole  purveyor  of  the  Social  Whole  in  the 
branch  of  business  indicated.  Thus  we  behold 
the  realm  of  social  struggle,  each  individual 
endeavoring  to  supplant  the  other. 

There  is  a  state  of  peaceful  Competition  in 
which  each  competitor  serves  his  customers  of  a 
certain  class  or  locality,  and  within  these  limits 
he  may  have  a  monopoly.  But  the  inherent 
character  of  the  middleman  is  to  become  all- 
willed  and  thus  to  be  the  complete  representative 
of  the  Social  Whole.  Hence  Competition  is  in- 
clined to  engender  a  state  of  war,  fostering  an 
ajrgressive  mood  aniono:  middlemen,  which  often 

CO  O  ' 

means  the  social  destruction  of  rivals. 


230  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Such  is  the  negative  side  of  Competition  in 
which  the  middleman  may  annihilate  his  com- 
petitor, but  is  likely  to  cripple  if  not  annihilate 
himself  in  doingf  so.  The  Social  Whole  begins 
to  evolve  a  new  mediating  principle,  since  the 
competing  middlemen  in  destroying  one  another 
have  destroyed  social  mediation.  Moreover  this 
war  involves  the  laborer  and  compels  the  reduc- 
tion of  his  wages  or  his  means  of  living.  Thus 
the  whole  fabric  of  Society  becomes  disordered 
through  the  negative  power  of  Competition,  mer- 
cantile, and  specially  industrial. 

Many  efforts  have  been  made  to  get  rid  of  the 
evil  effects  of  Competition.  Some  of  these  end  in 
moral  exhortations  to  brotherly  love  and  humanity , 
which  are  well  enough,  but  are  not  institutional 
and  hence  not  coercive.  Then  come  attempts  to 
re-model  society  entirely,  of  which  socialism  is 
the  farthest-reaching  example.  The  Social 
Whole  is  invoked  to  cut  up  Competition  by  the 
roots  through  taking  awa}'  its  human  motive, 
individual  ownership.  This,  however,  to  cure 
one  negation,  introduces  a  still  deeper  negation, 
that  of  all  society  as  at  present  constituted. 

But  the  Social  Whole  as  existent  and  always 
working  itself  out  in  the  world,  will  evolve  its 
own  new  middleman  to  meet  the  new  emergency. 
Society  as  the  active  all-willed  Product  will  call 
forth  the  all-willed  middleman  in  correspondence 
with  itself.     There  will  be  a  return  to  Monopoly, 


SOCIETY.  231 

but  it  will  be  of  a  new  sort,  having  passed 
through  and  mastered  its  own  Negative,  namely 
Competition. 

(3)  This  new  middleman,  we  have  already 
named  monocratic  (social,  universal),  and  is  an 
evolution  out  of  the  previous  middleman,  who  is 
driven  from  his  monopolistic  supremacy  by  a  new 
monopolist. 

The  market  demands  a  certain  quantity  of 
products,  which  the  given  middleman  can  sup- 
ply ;  but  other  middlemen  enter  the  field  and 
compete  with  him,  taking  away  his  profits  and 
threatening  to  drive  him  out  of  business.  As  he 
is  the  man  possessing  administrative  ability,  he 
seeks  to  make  a  new  synthesis  to  meet  the  emer- 
gency. 

Knowing  or  calculating  the  demand  in  his 
sphere  of  business,  he  seizes  or  combines  all  the 
sources  of  supply,  he  dictates  the  quantity  of  the 
product  and  the  price  both  of  buying  and  selling. 
Those  who  resist  his  arrangements  are  crushed 
by  the  enormous  power  of  the  combination. 
Thus  he  destroys  competition  by  a  new  associa- 
tion of  capital.  Such  is  the  trust  with  its  man- 
ager, springing  out  of  the  previous  industrial 
middleman,  who  combined  Labor  and  Capital 
in  his  enterprise,  but  who  left  outside  of  his 
organization  the  rising  middleman;  the  latter 
enters  the  same  field  and  competes  with  him  for 
the  consumer.     Such  competition  is  now  mediated. 


232  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Thus  appears  the  new  middleman^  the  universal, 
the  monocratic,  bearing  rule  over  vast  industrial 
domains.  He  combines  the  dissident  elements ; 
he  unifies  the  competing  enterprises  in  one  or  sev- 
eral branches  of  business ;  he  capitalizes  the  total 
investment  and  issues  stock  in  proportion,  with 
which  stock  he  enters  the  mone}^  market  and  gets 
more  capital ;  he  also  subjects  labor  to  this  new 
order,  so  that  the  workmen  of  a  certain  locality 
may  be  commanded  to  cease  from  produc- 
tion, lest  the  supply  may  be  in  excess  of  the 
demand. 

In  such  fashion  the  universal  middleman  as  in- 
dustrial monarch  bids  the  war  of  competition 
cease,  even  down  to  the  retailer,  drawing  what 
capital  he  may  require  not  directly  from  the 
capitalist  usually,  but  from  the  universal  money- 
market  which  he  will  also  control.  Both  the 
mercantile  and  the  industrial  middleman  he  sways 
according  to  his  will,  and  the  laborer  is  wholly 
determined  by  the  vast  social  machine. 

The  social  Spirit  is  now  incorporate  in  the  social 
Monocrat,  a  new  kind  of  man,  not  monarch  nor 
aristocrat  nor  even  democrat  in  the  old  sense  of 
the  term,  though  he  is  properly  the  counterpart 
of  democracy.  He  is  the  man  in  whom  Society 
is  at  present  most  deeply  interested,  being  occu- 
pied in  evolving  him,  with  no  small  curiosity  as 
to  what  he  is  going  to  do  with  it  and  with  him- 
self.    In  him  as  its  middleman  the  Social  Whole 


SOCIETY.  233 

seems  destined  to  find  its  incarnation  according 
to  the  present  outlook. 

The  social  Monocrat  is  of  course  not  yet  su- 
preme, though  moving  thitherward.  Tlie  indus- 
trial middleman,  as  was  noted,  had  to  look  out  for 
three  kinds  of  Competition :  that  of  the  labor- 
market,  that  of  the  product-market,  and  that  of 
the  money-market.  Only  partially  at  times  could 
he  control  any  one  of  these  markets ;  finally  thej- 
would  control  him.  Many  middlemen  would 
compete  for  labor  in  a  given  period,  and  up  would 
go  wages;  then  they  would  compete  in  the  selling 
market  of  their  products,  and  down  would  go 
prices ;  as  to  money,  in  a  crisis  when  they  most 
need  it,  they  often  cannot  get  it  at  any  price. 
Such  a  discordant,  anarchic,  competitive  condition 
of  the  Social  Whole  cannot  last. 

But  this  new  middleman  will  control  all  three 
markets — labor,  product  and  money.  He  has 
unified  or  rather  reduced  to  his  sway  all  the  com- 
peting middlemen  in  one  branch  or  probabl}'^ 
several  cognate  branches  of  business.  He  con- 
trols the  product-market  by  limiting  the  output, 
and  by  getting  hold  of  the  means  of  transporta- 
tion to  the  market ;  he  determines  the  quantity 
of  labor  and  its  reward,  closing  factories  and  dis- 
missing workmen  at  will ;  he  goes  back  of  the 
Bank  and  manipulates  the  Bourse  or  universal 
money  market  by  means  of  his  stocks.  All  this 
is  usually  done  by  a  company  or  its  Board  of 


234  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Directors,  who,  however,  have  always  a  guiding 
spirit,  the  one  Will,  the  Monocrat. 

Thus  the  all-willed  Product  as  social  Middle- 
man comes  back  to  the  one-willed  social  Product, 
who  is  also  the  supreme  Producer.  In  this  pro- 
cess we  have  returned  to  the  beginning  of  Posi- 
tive Society,  which  was  the  one  Will  producing. 
But  the  Product  is  now  not  simply  the  material 
thing  but  the  Social  Whole  itself  as  mediated  — 
mediated  by  its  one-willed  Product,  the  Mono- 
crat. 

The  Social  Individual,  in  the  very  pursuit  of 
freedom,  has  called  up  a  master  who  commands 
him,  confines  hiin,  compels  him.  As  he  is  de- 
pendent on  the  Social  Whole  for  his  daily  exist- 
ence, the  least  trouble  or  disease  in  it  affects  him. 
If  a  panic  comes,  or  if  there  is  a  scarcity  of  the 
harvest,  the  Social  Individual  is  involved;  if  a 
skillful  operator  gets  hold  of  the  social  machin- 
ery and  manipulates  it  for  his  own  private  end,  all 
feel  the  shock,  and  the  peversion  of  the  Institu- 
tion. Thus  the  Social  Individual  begins  to  feel 
himself  not  liberated,  but  enslaved  by  the  Social 
Whole.  In  passing  from  Nature  to  Society  he 
may  get  to  thinking  that  he  has  only  changed 
tyrants ;  indeed,  he  may  come  to  believe  that  Na- 
ture alone  gives  freedom,  while  Society  makes  the 
man  a  slave.  A  writer  and  an  age  may  have  such 
a  conviction,  which  sometimes  reaches  the  point 
of   taking  possession  of   literature  and   starting 


SOCIETY.  235 

men  to  action  in  the  overthrow  of  all  Society. 
Such  was  the  cry  of  Rousseau,  and  the  result  was 
the  French  Revolution.  Thus  we  come  to  the 
reversionary,  reactionary ,  descending  stage,  which 
seeks  to  return  to  former  social  epochs,  even  to 
get  back  to  Nature. 

We  hold,  therefore,  that  the  development  of 
the  Social  Monocracy  is  in  the  order  of  things, 
but  there  is  no  denying  that  it  has  a  fearful  neg- 
ative side  in  it,  a  destructive  energy  which  may 
produce  the  cataclysm  of  the  whole  institutional 
world.  The  Social  Whole  unfolding  into  free- 
dom may  produce  the  destroyer  of  that  freedom. 
The  political  despot  of  former  ages  may  be  suc- 
ceeded by  the  social  despot  of  the  present  age, 
and  the  latter  may  be  worse  than  the  former, 
unless  controlled  by  Law.  Hence  the  new  de- 
mand upon  the  State  just  here,  and  the  loud  cry 
for  the  new  lawgiver  to  step  forward  and  subject 
the  Social  Monocrat  to  legality,  protecting  him 
in  his  just  sphere  and  even  fostering  the  great 
progressive  principle  which  he  embodies,  but  at 
the  same  time  curbing  him  in  his  violation  of 
institutional  freedom. 

This  negative  movement  of  Society  is  a  constit- 
uent part  of  the  total  social  process  (or  the  Social 
Psychosis),  and  is  the  element  which  we  are  next 
to  consider. 


236  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

II.  Negative  Society. 

The  Social  Order  as  the  economic  or  industrial 
Society  of  our  modern  age,  is  the  very  home  of 
negation,  conflict,  destruction.  As  this  Society 
has  on  one  side  its  end  in  the  satisfaction  of  the 
wants  of  the  invividual,  and  as  these  wants  are 
capable  of  an  almost  intinite  increase,  or  an  almost 
infinite  diminution,  we  behold  here  supremely 
the  arena  of  individual  struggle,  of  particularism, 
of  selfishness,  with  their  counterpart  in  human 
suffering,  misery  and  degradation.  In  such  a 
condition  it  is  manifest  that  Society  is  losing  the 
end  of  its  existence,  has,  in  fact,  become  neg- 
ative to  the  object  of  its  creation. 

The  great  purpose  of  Society  is  to  mediate  the 
wants  of  the  individual  through  the  Institution, 
and  thus  to  relieve  him  of  the  immediate  domi- 
nation of  Nature.  In  other  words,  man  is  to  ob- 
tain economic  freedom  through  the  Social  Order, 
which  is,  as  already  often  stated,  a  form  of 
actualized  Will  whose  end  is  to  secure  Free- Will. 
Thus  man  is  to  rise  to  an  ethical  life  and  to  be- 
come institutional  just  through  his  wants,  receiv- 
ing a  return  for  his  labor  through  the  Social 
Whole. 

But  the  social  individual,  having  liberated  him- 
self from  the  tyranny  of  Nature  finds  himself  ex- 
posed to  another  and  even  more  terrible  tyranny, 
that  of  the  Social  Whole  itself,  which  has  taken 


SOCIETY.  237 

the  place  of  the  external  and  largely  accidental 
determination  of  a  state  of  Nature.  The  result 
is  the  social  individual  wvaj  see  himself  reduced 
quite  back  to  the  natural  individual,  with  all  the 
wants  of  his  physical  being  upon  him,  yet  with- 
out the  means  of  gratifying  them  through  the 
Institution  or  through  Nature,  since  the  latter 
has  been  seized  in  all  her  native  products  and 
bounties  just  by  the  Institution  and  made  over  into 
its  property,  or  into  property  sanctioned  by  it. 
No  wonder  that  the  individual  becomes  negative 
to  Society,  when  Society  has  become  so  negative 
to  him. 

On  the  other  side  stands  the  individual  whose 
wants  are  more  than  satisfied,  who,  being  a  colos- 
sal bundle  of  pleasures  and  caprices  which  are 
self -generating  and  hence  are  ever  increasing, 
demands  and  obtains  gratification,  through  So- 
ciety. Such  is  the  grand  social  dualism.  Pov- 
erty and  Wealth,  Misery  and  Luxury,  springing 
just  out  of  the  Institution  which  secures  the  in- 
dividual Will,  which  latter,  however,  has  here 
divided  itself  into  two  Wills,  one  of  which  is 
secured  and  the  other  suppressed  or  destroyed. 
Truly  may  Society  in  its  negative  aspect  be  said 
to  fulfill  the  scriptural  declaration:  "To  him 
that  hath  shall  be  given,  and  from  him  that  hath 
not  shall  be  taken  away  even  that  which  he  hath. ' ' 
The  extreme  form  of  the  social  negation  of 
Society  is  sometimes  heard  in  the  words:     "  The 


238  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

rich  become  richer  and  the  poor  poorer."  Thus 
Society  is  destroying  its  very  end,  and  shows  in 
itself  the  process  of  its  own  self -undoing. 

At  the  same  time,  we  may  here  insert,  Society 
is  trying  to  remedy  its  own  evil,  to  negate  its  own 
negative  through  a  system  of  universal  education. 
The  social  individual  undoubtedly  finds  himself 
in  a  world  of  dependence,  confined  on  all  sides, 
but  just  through  this  dependence  he  becomes  a  hnk 
in  the  Social  Whole  ;  thus  he  makes  himself  neces- 
sary to  the  entire  chain,  and  commands  it  for  his 
end  also.  To  be  sure,  he  must  make  himself  a 
link  through  skill  and  intelligence,  he  must  be 
trained  to  see  and  participate  in  the  Social  Whole, 
and  thereby  assist  in  creating  it,  so  that  it  needs 
him  as  much  as  he  needs  it.  If  he  be  a  mere 
mechanical  link,  wholly  moved  from  the  outside, 
he  can  be  easily  dropped  out ;  having  nothing 
essential  to  contribute  he  cannot  receive,  and  so 
starves  in  the  midst  of  plenty.  He  no  longer 
can  take  immediately  as  man  cuice  did  in  the 
primitive  condition,  everything  is  already  taken. 
Ultimately  the  social  individual  must  be  able  to 
make  his  Self  a  part  of  the  Social  Whole,  ready 
to  adjust  himself  and  to  give  what  Society  will  pay 
for.  He  must  be  not  simply  one  link,  but  ideally 
all  links;  that  is,  he  must  enter  society  with  an 
universal  training,  which  is  given  by  education. 
Not  simply  a  link,  but  capable  of  nuiking  himself 
a  link,  not  simi)ly  a  machine,  but  a  machine-con- 


SOCIETY.  239 

troller;  thus  Society  is  seeking  to  transform 
every  human  being  born  in  its  bosom  through 
education,  by  putting  into  his  hand  the  means  of 
self-liberation  from  its  own  tyranny.  And  Ave 
may  also  hope  that  education  will  become  the 
corrective  of  the  other  extreme,  of  luxury  as 
well  as  of  poverty. 

At  present,  however,  our  purpose  is  to  set 
forth  the  negative  forces  which  have  shown 
themselves  in  Society,  and  which  are  at  this  mo- 
ment working  in  full  energy.  We  shall  behold 
the  social  individual  assailed  and  tyrannized  over 
by  the  Social  Whole ;  then  the  Social  Whole  is 
assailed  and  tyrannized  over  by  the  social 
individual ;  out  of  which  conflict  we  shall  see 
rising  a  Perverted  Society,  the  extreme  of  nega- 
tion. 

In  the  first  two  cases  we  have  the  struggle  be- 
tween Society  and  the  Individual,  or,  as  it  is  often 
expressed,  the  war  between  Capital  and  Labor. 
It  is  the  existent  Society,  which  the  individual  or 
the  laborino;  individual  seeks  to  restrain  or  con- 
trol.  But  when  he  finds  himself  defeated,  he 
begins  to  construct  a  new  Society  of  his  own 
over  against  the  existent  Society  which  he  deems 
his  oppressor.  This  new  Society  he  proposes  to 
use  for  his  own  end,  which  is  to  take  the  place  of 
the  normal  social  Order.  Hence  we  call  it  a 
Perverted  Society,  which  is  the  culmination  and 
final  self-undoing  of  what  Ave  have  here  designated 


240  (SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

as  Negative  Society.     This  process  with  its  three 
stages  is  as  follows :  — 

I.  Society  assails  the  Individual;  this  will 
show  the  three  leading  social  elements  —  the 
middleman,  the  individual  as  workman  or  laborer, 
and  the  Social  Whole  in  its  totality  —  assailing 
the  social  individual  in  his  freedom  and  thus 
negativing  the  end  of  Society  as  an  Institution. 

II.  The  Individual  assails  Society;  this  will 
show  the  counterpart  to  the  preceding ;  the  social 
Individual  in  self-defense  will  organize  against 
the  Social  Whole  and  pass  through  the  various 
stages  of  struggle,  triumph  and  defeat.  Finding 
himself  subordinated  in  the  old  Society  and  un- 
able to  control  it,  he  will  seek  to  establish  a  new 
Society  in  opposition. 

III.  Perverted  Society;  this  is  a  Society  or- 
ganized on  a  W' holly  different  principle  from  the 
regular  or  transmiUed  Society  as  it  has  evolved 
itself  in  historic  time.  Here  w^e  shall  observe 
three  main  forms  —  Communism,  Socialism  (in- 
dustrial), and  Nihilism. 

In  this  process  we  may  likewise  note  the  psy- 
chical movement.  The  first  stage,  in  which 
Society  determines  or  suppresses  the  Individual, 
is  the  immediate  one  socially,  as  it  is  seen  in  the 
earliest  forms  of  Society.  But  in  the  second 
stage,  when  the  Individual  organizes  against  the 
Social  AYhole,  yet  still  remains  inside  of  it  with 
his  organization  (as  in  labor  unions),  w^e  see  the 


SOCIETY.  ^41 

separation,  the  social  twofoldness  and  its  strife. 
The  third  stage  shows  the  Individual  forming  a 
new  Society  whose  essence  is  to  determine  and 
dominate  the  workman  or  laborer,  and  thus  it  is 
a  return  to  the  first  stage,  wliich  also  had  this 
characteristic.  We  shall  find  that  socialism  (the 
third  stage)  is  a  reversion  to  the  first,  but  after 
the  Individual  has  passed  through  the  second. 

I.  Society  assails  the  Individual.  This  is 
the  tyranny  of  which  mention  has  been  made 
above;  the  social  man,  having  been  freed  from 
the  immediate  determination  of  Nature,  is  assailed 
and  possibly  enslaved  or  annihilated  by  the  great 
social  machine.  Thus,  Society  as  an  Institution, 
whose  end  is  freedom  on  its  economic  side,  is 
transformed  into  something  just  the  opposite  of 
itself,  having  become  a  crushing  despot,  or  the 
means  of  a  crushing  despotism.  The  individual 
may  be  cut  off  from  all  participation  in  the  Social 
Whole  just  through  the  Social  Whole,  when  the 
latter  is  manipulated  foi"  a  personal  end,  by  the 
operator  or  middleman.  Capital,  the  Corpora- 
tion, the  Trust  —  many  souls,  yet  not  one  soul  — 
are  some  of  the  well-known  social  implements 
which  the  skillful  hand  in  these  days  employs 
against  the  social  individual  in  order  to  get  a  part 
at  least  of  his  part  of  the  remuneration  for  social 
effort.  The  man  who  is  fast  in  the  social  ma- 
chine is  no  lono;er  a  freeman,  and  this  conscious- 
ness  he  has  recently  gained  partially,  and  is  still 

IG 


242^  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

gaining  amid  suffering,  and  folly,  and  impreca- 
tion, often  with  blows  delivered  on  the  wrong 
thing. 

1.  The  assault  through  the  middleman.  Al- 
ready we  have  seen  Society  evolving  three  kinds 
of  middlemen  in  gradation:  the  mercantile,  the 
industrial  and  the  monopolistic.  Through  the 
latter  comes  the  assault  upon  the  social  individ- 
ual, as  he  seizes  subtly  the  might  of  the  Institu- 
tion and  turns  its  golden  stream  into  his  own  lap. 
To  be  sure,  he  does  this  through  superior  ability 
which  must  have  superior  pay;  still  he,  finding 
himself  in  control  of  the  social  instruments,  is 
tempted  to  take  more  thau  his  share,  and  usually 
he  yields  to  the  temptation.  He  is  the  exploiter 
of  labor  and  performs  a  great  function  in  the 
economic  Order,  but  he  is  using  it  to  further  his 
individual  end  which  he  pursues  with  remorseless 
energy,  and  with  almost  unlimited  power.  The 
law  which  ought  to  limit  him  he  but  too  often 
evades  or  defies  or  buys.  The  merchant  prince, 
the  industrial  king,  the  railroad  emperor  are  the 
rulers,  quite  absolute,  being  the  new  magnates 
who  have  quite  supplanted  the  aristocracy  of 
birth  in  a  number  of  lands.  lu  correspondence 
with  them  is  the  new  class  of  subjects  whose 
effort  is  controlled  and  absorbed  in  part  by  the 
new  monarchs.  How  this  is  done  we  may  glance 
at  in  a  few  words. 

( 1 )  First  comes  the  system  of  wages  in  modern 


SOCIETY.  243 

society,  showing  the  social  individual  as  wage- 
earner,  whose  share  in  the  many-willed  product 
is  determined  by  the  middleman  largely  though 
not  wholly.  It  is  a  maxim  of  Marx  and  his  school 
that  this  system  of  wages  is  really  a  sy.stem  of 
slavery,  of  the  last  or  industrial  kind,  as  Society 
has  for  the  most  part  passed  through  its  two 
former  stages  of  slavery,  that  of  bodily  servitude 
and  that  of  serfdom.  We  must  see  what  there 
is  of  truth  in  this  statement,  though  we  may  not 
be  able  to  accept  Marx'  remedy.  He  shows  in 
a  very  striking  way  that  the  wage-earner  in  the 
social  mechanism  is  very  seriously  assailed  on 
the  side  of  his  freedom,  and  that  this  is  done  by 
the  middleman  manipulating  the  instrumentalities 
of  Society  for  his  own  advantage.  That  which 
makes  wealth,  according  to  Marx,  is  the  "  surplus 
value"  of  labor,  which  really  belongs  to  the 
laborer,  but  which  the  middleman  (or  the  capital- 
ist in  the  language  of  Marx)  seizes  through  the 
wage-system  and  appropriates  to  himself  in  the 
shape  of  profits.  Hence  it  is  the  interest  of  the 
middleman  to  keep  down  the  wages  of  the  work- 
man to  the  point  of  bare  subsistence  for  himself 
and  for  his  family,  which  reproduces  labor. 

(2)  The  middleman  having  reduced  the  work- 
man to  the  wage-laborer  next  proceeds  to  take 
his  wages  or  to  make  them  a  means  of  still  fur- 
ther  subjection.  In  connection  with  the  mine  or 
mill  or  factory  the  store  is  established   by  the 


244  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

middleman  who  compels  his  workmen  to  buy 
their  necessaries  of  life  from  him,  and  in  this 
fashion  takes  another  profit  out  of  wages.  In 
like  manner  the  Avorkman's  house  is  often  owned 
by  the  middleman  who  has  become  both  industrial 
and  mercantile.  Thus  the  laborer  is  simply  cut 
oif  from  the  Social  Whole  as  he  has  nothing  to 
buy  and  nothing  to  sell ;  the  middleman  has  taken 
the  place  of  the  Social  Institution  for  the  social 
individual,  who  is,  therefore,  no  longer  a  mem- 
ber of  Society.  The  Institution  whose  function 
is  to  secure  economic  freedom  is  supplanted  by 
the  middleman,  who  has  become  the  absolute 
sovereign  over  the  workman. 

These  arrangements  may  be  and  often  are 
made  with  regard  to  the  welfare  of  the  laborer. 
Even  if  better  housed,  fed  and  clothed  than  for- 
merly, he  has  lost  freedom,  the  boon  of  life;  at 
best  there  is  a  relapse  to  paternalism,  to  the 
patriarchal  Society,  which  may  be  mild  and  provi- 
dent, but  which  is  unfree,  and  hence  in  deep 
collision  with  his  inmost  aspiration  as  well  as 
with  the  movement  of  civilization. 

(3)  Still  further,  inside  the  workshop  the 
middleman  limits  the  workman  more  and  more  in 
his  work,  confining  him  to  an  ever-diminishing 
portion  of  the  total  product  through  the  division 
of  labor,  by  which  his  efficiency  is  increased. 
Thereby,  however,  he  becomes  a  little  part  of 
a  great  mechanism,  more  and  more  narrowed  in 


SOCIETY.  245 

its  existence  till  his  place  is  actually  taken  by  a 
machine,  when  he  is  thrown  out  of  employment 
and  cast  forth  into  the  world. 

Such  is  the  middleman's  negative  procedure 
toward  the  social  individual  as  workman,  whom 
he  has  first  deprived  of  surplus  earnings,  then  of 
social  freedom,  and  finally  of  work  itself  as  the 
means  of  subsistence.  The  middleman  has  done 
all  this  in  the  existent  social  Order,  but  it  is 
clear  that  he  has  subverted  the  very  purpose  of 
Society  which  is  not  to  destroy  but  to  confirm 
the  freedom  of  the  individual.  Thus  the  middle- 
man through  the  manipulation  of  his  resources 
has  made  Society  negative  to  itself.  Not  in  all 
cases  is  this  extreme  result  reached,  still  the 
tendency  exists. 

Not  alone  is  the  workman  assailed  from  with- 
out by  the  middleman,  he  is  also  confronted  by  a 
destructive  element  inside  his  own  class. 

2.  TJie  assault  ilirougli  the  worhman.  Con- 
sidering the  social  individual  still  as  workman,  we 
are  now  to  see  him  assailed  by  his  fellow-workman, 
who  will  take  away  his  social  freedom  quite  as 
effectually  and  with  even  greater  violence  than 
did  the  middleman.  Later  we  shall  note  how 
labor  organizes  itself  primarily  to  secure  its  social 
freedom,  but  it  too  will  fall  into  doing  just  the 
opposite  and  will  deprive  its  own  class  of  liberty 
of  action.  Some  of  these  manifestations  we  shall 
briefly  designate  here. 


246  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

(1)  The  laborer  is  forced  to  join  some  labor 
orgranization  often  against  his  ^vill:  then  he  is 
forced  to  strike  against  his  employers,  without 
any  regard  to  his  wishes ;  he  must  lie  idle  and 
perchance  starve  at  the  command  of  the  new 
master.  Thus  the  workman  orgranizinof  himself 
in  pursuit  of  freedom  has  destroyed  freedom  ;  he 
will  neither  work  himself  nor  let  others  work ; 
he  has  made  a  Society  negative  to  every  end  of 
Society.  As  this  means  loss  of  money,  starvation 
and  slavery,  there  rises  opposition. 

(2)  The  workman,  one  or  more,  declares  his 
independence  and  starts  to  work ;  he  seeks  to  free 
himself  of  this  new  slavery  coming  from  his 
class.  In  one  form  or  other  the  conflict  opens 
between  the  workmen  themselves,  a  kind  of  civil 
war  in  the  laboring  ranks.  Often  there  are 
pitched  battles,  m  which  the  State  has  to  be  in- 
voked to  preserve  the  peace. 

(3)  The  result  is  the  establishment  of  a  reign 
of  terror  by  labor  over  labor ;  the  organization  of 
workmen  annihilates  the  individual  workman. 
The  latter  has  a  new  and  peculiar  fear  in  the 
social  organism:  he  is  afraid  to  work.  The  pri- 
mordial right  of  man,  the  right  of  living  by  his 
own  hands, is  taken  away.  No  Asiatic  despotism 
has  ever  so  fundamentally  assailed  and  destroyed 
the  social  individual.  Of  course,  all  this  is  done 
in  the  name  of  liberty,  which,  however,  has  un- 
done even  the  liberty  of  work. 


SOCIETY.  247 

As  the  workmuu  with  wife  and  children  must 
live,  he  turns  like  a  beggar  to  picking  up  what 
he  can  find  outside  his  vocation,  from  which  he 
has  been  expelled.  An  outcast  from  the  Social 
Order  which  he  wishes  to  serve,  he  goes  forth  to 
a  new  locality  in  order  to  begin  life  afresh.  In 
the  hope  of  escaping  the  destructive  energy  which 
his  own  class  has  generated,  he  flees  to  some  un- 
observed nook  where  he  may  still  find  the  liberty 
to  work. 

But  he  may  experience  even  in  the  remote  cor- 
ner that  there  is  a  negative  force  coming  from 
the  social  Order  and  penetrating  his  little  world. 

3.  The  assault  through  Society  as  a  Whole. 
The  social  individual  is  also  exposed  to  the  great 
general  movements  of  the  social  Order,  which  at 
given  periods  become  negative  and  produce  what 
are  called  "  Hard  Times."  These  movements 
do  not  proceed  from  an  individual  like  the  mid- 
dleman, nor  from  a  class  like  the  workmen, 
though  both  are  included.  The  Social  Whole 
has  its  own  life,  its  own  process  accompanied 
with  relapses  and  convulsions  of  various  kinds, 
which  thrill  through  the  organism  and  involve 
every  member. 

Production  is  a  social  act,  the  result  of  many 
Wills  co-operating,  indeed  of  the  whole  social 
Order.  It  is  not  easy  to  assign  to  each  his  share 
in  the  many-willed  Product ;  this  difficulty  calls 
forth  the  wage-system  which  gives  to  the  work- 


iM^ 


248  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

man  at  least  his  immediate  sustenance,  and  it 
may  be  more.  But  Competition  enters,  which  is 
a  kind  of  war  between  industrial  middlemen  for 
the  profits  of  a  business  which  has  a  good  market. 
But  the  market  is  after  all  limited  and  becomes 
overstocked;  at  this  point  Competition  enters 
fiercely,  cutting  down  profits  and  also  wages. 
As  the  majority  of  people  are  dependent  on 
wages,  their  ability  to  purchase  is  lessened  by  a 
decline  in  their  earnings.  Such  a  decline  be- 
comes general  and  everybody  is  more  or  less 
affected. 

In  order  to  prevent  Competition  from  destroy- 
ing them,  the  industrial  middlemen  begin  to  com- 
bine instead  of  competing  with  one  another.  The 
extent  of  the  market  is  known  and  production  is 
adjusted  to  it,  whereby  profits  are  saved.  Thus 
we  have  the  phenomenon  of  the  Trust  in  its 
recent  colossal  development.  Then  ('ombination 
in  its  turn  becomes  tyrannical,  dictating  every- 
thino;  in  its  field  and  crushiuo^  out  the  social  indi- 
vidual  both  as  workman  and  as  merchant. 

But  the  most  striking  instance  of  the  social 
individual  assailed  and  rendered  helpless  by  a 
great  social  movement  is  seen  in  the  panic.  In 
addition  to  economic  causes  (such  as  over-pro- 
duction, speculation,  etc.),  there  comes  into  play 
the  subjective  factor,  which  is  most  important. 
An  universal  distrust  of  every  social  instrument 
seizes  the  whole  body  of  Society,  and  a  rush  is 


SOCIETY.  249 

made  specially  to  realize  every  form  of  credit. 
Then  consumption  dwindles,  particularly  of  all 
unessential  articles ;  vast  quantities  of  labor  are 
thrown  out  of  employment,  and  the  laborer  has 
to  purchase  the  least  possible,  and  so  is  forced 
to  add  to  the  depression.  Such  is  the  social 
Fate  which  seems  to  be  always  hanging  over  the 
individual,  and  which  he  himself  helps  to  create.  , 

Thus  Society  may  assail  its  individual  member  Th-x  \i^ 
through  its  Panic  (1),  which  springs  forth  usu-  ^  ^ 
ally  unforeseen  and  rages  like  an  epidemic,  smit- 
ing right  and  left  all  classes  of  people  as  if  it  '^ 
were  an  avenging  Nemesis  for  some  great  social 
transgression,  which  it  doubtless  is.  Then  comes 
the  assault  w^hich  springs  from  Competition  (2) 
of  the  middlemen,  who  first  assail  one  another, 
but  after  a  time  involve  everybody  in  their  con- 
flict, especially  their  own  workmen,  who  have  at 
last,  like  the  common  soldier,  to  sustain  the  bur- 
den of  the  war.  But  the  Competitors  also  suffer, 
and  so  they  make  peace  with  one  another  and 
enter  into  a  Combination  (3)  which  is  to  do  away 
with  the  war  of  Competition,  and  control  all  pro- 
duction as  well  as  the  producers.  The  Social 
Body,  at  least  in  the  given  sphere,  has  now  a  mas- 
ter, whose  development  we  have  traced  more 
fully  in  another  connection.  This  master  (mo- 
nopolist, monocrat)  w'ill  have  the  function  of 
preserving  the  Social  "Whole  from  the  sudden  and 
unexpected  throes  of  the  Panic,  as  well  as  from 


-t^ 


250  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS 

the  destructive  war  of  Competitiou.  Such  we 
ma}'^  deem  his  good  side,  but  on  the  other  hand 
social  freedom  lies  at  his  feet,  or  perchance 
under  his  feet  if  he  chooses  to  put  it  there. 

It  is  manifest  at  this  stage  that  the  Social 
Wiiole  which  man  has  projected  out  of  himself 
into  the  world  for  the  purpose  of  actualizing  his 
Free-Will  more  completely,  and  has  made  the 
mediator  of  his  Wants,  has  indeed  helped  him  to 
one  kind  of  freedom,  freedom  from  the  domina- 
tion of  Nature.  But  it  has  begotten  a  new  kind 
of  subjection,  the  individual  has  become  depend- 
ent just  on  this  Social  Whole,  its  action  and  non- 
action, often  irregular  enough;  if  its  j^rocess  be 
interrupted  —  and  we  have  seen  it  to  be  exposed 
to  various  kinds  of  interruption  —  he  may  be 
cut  off  from  his  food,  and  even  from  the  oppor- 
tunity to  labor.  The  result  must  be  that  he  will 
rise  against  the  Social  Whole  and  seek  to  deter- 
mine it,  or  at  least  to  prevent  it  from  determining 
him  so  absolutely.  We  may  indeed  call  it  the 
new  struggle  for  freedom. 

But  ere  we  pass  to  this  part  of  our  subject,  we 
may  glance  back  of  the  social  phase  we  have  just 
passed  through,  under  the  caption  Society  assails 
the  Individual.  This  assault  we  have  seen  tak- 
ing place  through  the  three  main  social  factors  — 
through  the  mediating  princl[)le  or  middleman, 
through  the  Social  Individual  himself  as  the  pro- 
ducer or  workman,  and  throuah  the  Social  Whole 


SOCIETY.  251 

in  its  totality,  whicli  is  finally  represented  by  a 
single  Will,  a  master  and  possibly  a  tyrant. 

Accordingly  we  shall  next  witness  the  counter 
movement  which  will  show  the  Social  Individual 
organizino;  himself  against  Societv,  in  order  to 
control  it  and  make  it  secure  his  freedom,  which 
it  has  jeoparded,  if  not  destroyed. 

II.  The  Individual  assails  Society.  Here 
is  specially  the  sphere  of  conflict.  It  now  is  the 
turn  of  the  Social  Individual  to  move.  Knowing 
that  he  is  as  necessary  to  the  Social  Whole  as  it 
is  to  him,  he  organizes  himself  into  a  new  So- 
ciety, thus  making  two  within  the  Social  Whole. 
He  withdraws  and  stops  the  working  of  the  lat- 
ter or  deranges  it  greatl3^  His  blow  is  directed 
against  the  middleman,  but  it  involves  the  whole 
community,  and  may  extend  much  further. 

This  is  a  move  for  freedom,  freedom  from  the 
Social  Machine  with  its  servitude.  The  work- 
men organize  into  their  own  combination  against 
the  combination  of  wealth  and  refuse  to  give  their 
labor  to  the  Social  Whole,  whose  food  is  this  labor. 
So  the  laborer  is  forced  to  learn  something 
of  organization,  and  he  enters  the  struggle, 
which  at  first  wins,  provided  that  he  keeps  within 
bounds  and  seeks  a  true  social  freedom.  But  ho 
will  not  keep  within  such  bounds,  success  will 
destroy  him  by  bringing  him  to  do  the  ver}' 
wrong  which  he  fights  against.  His  special  asso- 
ciation   will  bo  guilty  of    the  same  a  i(j]ation  oi' 


26S  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

freedom  which  he  complains  of  in  the  Social 
Order,  and  which  he  has  organized  it  to  suppress. 
Thus  he  must  in  the  end  be  defeated,  in  fact  he 
defeats  himself. 

1.  Organization  of  Labor.  One  of  the  great 
social  phenomena  of  the  present  is  the  power 
which  labor  has  shown  of  organizing  itself  and 
conducting  a  long  and  bitter  campaign. 

Often  this  organization  exists,  not  with  a  neg- 
ative purpose  directly,  its  design  is  not  to  assail, 
but  to  supplant  by  self -effort  the  middleman. 
The  laborer  becomes  or  calls  forth  his  own  mid- 
dleman, and  thus  re-establishes  society  in  its 
simple  form,  producing  a  kind  of  reversion  to 
primitive  conditions — co-operation,  profit-shar- 
ing, labor-banks,  etc.  But  these  can  hardly  be 
permanent  in  spite  of  local  or  temporary  success. 
They  are  a  corrective  more  than  a  substitute,  and 
their  real  purpose  is  to  cause  a  reformation  in 
oppressive  business  methods. 

The  organization  of  labor  is  directed  chiefly 
against  the  existent  abuse  or  tyranny  of  the  mid- 
dleman, who  is  employing  social  instrumentalities 
for  his  own  individual  ends.  If  he  can  be 
brought  to  terms,  the  struggle  usuallv  subsides, 
for  a  time  at  least.  The  fundamental  object  of 
the  organization  of  labor  is  to  secure  social  free- 
dom when  assailed,  but  this  organization  itself 
often  assails  social  freedom. 

There  has  always  been  some  form  of  associa- 


SOCI£TY.  368 

tion  among  workmen  for  their  protection  The 
guilds  of  the  Middle  Ages  are  well  known,  and 
have  transmitted  some  of  their  characteristics 
to  the  present.  But  the  modern  organization 
which  has  a  special  distinction  is  called  the 
Trades  Union ;  this  was  in  recent  times  over- 
topped by  the  Knights  of  Labor,  which  ex- 
tended throughout  the  nation,  and  sought  to  com- 
bine all  laborers  in  one  general  society.  Karl 
Marx  and  his  associates  did  not  like  the  national 
limit  and  so  formed  the  International,  which  en- 
deavored to  combine  the  workmen  of  all  nations 
into  a  united  power,  which  evidently  Marx  himself 
was  to  control.  But  this  has  fallen  to  pieces. 
Still  labor  has  kept  up  its  national  and  local  or- 
ganization, which  on  provocation  and  sometimes 
without  sufficient  provocation  declares  war. 

2.    The    triumph  of   labor.     This   must   take 
place   when  labor  makes  itself  the  champion  of  . 
those  oppressed  by  the  middleman  or  by  perverse 
social  arrangements.     When  the  laborer  has  to    i  '        nX*M 
live  in  the  house  owned  by  his  employer,  buy  at    '  "^ 
the  latter's  store,  and  pay  the  prices,  not  of  the  ' 

market  but  those  dictated  by  the  firm  he  works  ^ 
for,  he  is  socially  enslaved,  he  is  no  longer  a 
member  of  the  Social  Whole  and  its  process,  but 
is  forced  out  of  it  and  put  under  a  master. 
When  organized  labor  declares  war  against  such 
an  oppressor,  it  is  upholding  the  cause  of  man's 
freedom,    it   is    seeking  to  restore  the  right  of 


F 


264  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Society  to  people  from  whom  it  has  been  taken 
away. 

In  such  a  case  the  individual  is  assailing  So- 
ciety, but  he  has  his  justification.  Just  as  polit- 
ical rebellion  must  sometimes  be  resorted  to  for 
the  sake  of  vindicating  Free- Will,  so  this  social 
rebellion  has  its  place,  at  least  in  the  present 
order  of  things.  The  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  is  supposed  to  have  solved  the  problem  of 
political  Revolution,  but  there  is  as  yet  no  legal 
document  which  is  able  fully  to  cope  with  social 
revolt  in  the  economic  world.  The  war  comes 
on  and  is  fought  out  to  the  bitter  end,  no  ade- 
quate mediation  having  yet  been  discovered. 

Often  arbitration  is  spoken  of  as  the  means  and 
is  sometimes  employed.  But  the  arbitrator  has 
no  power  of  enforcing  his  judgment,  it  is  not 
Law,  it  is  not  an  integral  part  of  the  State,  which 
has  as  its  function  to  secure  by  might  the  enact- 
ment whose  object  is  to  vindicate  freedom. 
When  each  side  must  consent  to  the  decision,  it 
is  not  truly  institutional,  and  hence  is  no  solu- 
tion of  the  trouble.  The  State  must  be  the  final 
justiciary,  who  is  to  declare  and  to  enforce  Free- 
will through  the  Law. 

In  this  conflict  we  may  note  the  usual  stages 
through  which  the  two  opposing  sides  pass.  (1) 
Organized  labor  states  to  the  middleman  or  em- 
ployer its  grievances  not  only  in  the  matter  of 
wages,  but  in  other  matters  wherein  the  social 


SOCIETY.  255 

freedom  of  the  workman  is  violated  or  too  much 
curtailed.  (2)  When  the  demands  of  organized 
labor  are  not  listened  to,  then  it  withdraws  from 
production  and  there  is  what  is  known  as  the 
strike.  This  is  the  social  war  which  inflicts  in- 
jury on  both  sides;  one  set  is  losing  wages,  the 
other  profits  and  interest  and  probably  more. 
(3)  The  outcome  in  the  present  case  is  that  la- 
bor is  recognized,  it  has  made  valid  its  defense  of 
freedom,  having  compelled  the  middleman  or 
other  aggressor  to  cease  from  his  assault  on  the 
social  freedom  of  the  workman,  and  to  stop 
using  social  means  to  pervert  or  destroy  the  end 
of  Society. 

This  is  undoubtedly  a  great  public  service  per- 
formed by  organized  labor.  But  now  comes  the 
hardest  test,  the  test  of  success.  Will  labor 
abuse  its  victory?  The  fact  must  be  confessed 
that  it  has  never  failed  to  grow  tyrannical  in  tri- 
umph;  nay  it  usually  begins  its  tyranny  before 
victory  in  order  to  win  victory,  and  the  result  is 
that  it  is  almost  always  defeated.  For  when 
labor  organized  becomes  as  bad  as  the  middleman 
or  even  worse,  what  is  the  gain  in  changing  mas- 
ters?    Thus  we  have  to  chronicle  the  next  stage. 

3.  The  defeat  of  labor.  It  has  become  a  com- 
mon statement  that  nearly  every  strike  is  a  failure, 
even  though  it  begins  with  good  prospects  and 
with  public  sympathy.  And  the  fact  is  unques- 
tionable that    organized    workmen  are    apt    to 


•2o6  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

become  more  tyranuical  than  any  other  class  of 
men  in  modern  Society.  The  consequence  is 
that  there  is  a  ver}^  grave  doubt  even  among  well- 
wishers  whether  the  labor  organization  can  ob- 
tain the  freedom  and  the  rights  which  it  ought  to 
have.  When  its  cause  is  just  and  is  for  the  pub- 
lic good  and  for  progress,  it  is  sure  to  lose  by  its 
fatal  management.  The  laborer  when  he  starts 
to  fight  for  liberty,  turns  at  once  to  a  despot. 
He  seems  wholly  unable  to  keep  himself  out  of 
this  self-destroying  contradiction,  and  no  labor 
leader  has  yet  appeared  who  can  restrain  his  fol- 
lowing from  logical  suicide.  In  fact  he  usually 
becomes  the  leader  by  spurring  men  on  to  vio- 
lence which  must  come  back  to  themselves. 

From  vindicating  its  own  right,  labor  passes 
over  to  assailing  the  right  of  the  middleman  and 
of  the  Social  Whole.  When  it  finds  it  has  the 
power,  it  starts  to  abusing  its  victory,  too  often 
led  by  the  agitator,  the  sorehead,  the  demagogue. 
Labor  in  its  turn  assailincf  the  Free- Will  is  and 
must  be  finally  defeated,  it  has  logically  undone 
itself.  So  we  have  also  the  spectacle  of  the 
tyranny  of  labor  over  the  middleman,  following 
on  the  tyranny  of  the  middleman  over  labor. 

(1)  Labor  seeks  to  control  the  private  busi- 
ness of  the  middleman,  or  to  dictate  in  uuitters 
which  do  not  pertain  to  it.  Here  it  assumes 
authority  where  there  is  no  responsibihty,  and 
reallv  assails  the  Social  Whole,  which  is  to  secure 


SOCIETY.  257 

economic   freedom   to  all.     Hence  this  blow  it 
gives  to  its  own  principle. 

(2)  Labor  turns  and  enslaves  its  own.  The 
organization  seeks  to  enforce  its  mandate  upon 
every  laborer,  whether  he  belongs  to  it  or  not, 
whether  he  wills  so  or  not.  If  he  offers  to  work, 
he  meets  with  violence.  Thus  the  tyranny  of  labor 
destroys  the  freedom  of  labor ;  the  organization 
becomes  a  double  tyrant,  against  its  own  mem- 
bers and  against  all  who  wish  to  work. 

(3)  At  this  point  the  State  is  assailed  in  its 
fundamental  object,  and  has  to  put  down  labor 
by  violence,  so  that  the  outcome  of  the  tyranny 
of  labor  is  the  defeat  of  labor  by  means  of  that 
Institution  whose  supreme  function  is  to  secure 
Free-Will  by  law  backed  up  with  power.  Un- 
doubtedly such  a  defeat  has  its  drawback,  for  it 
is  apt  to  endow  the  middleman  with  a  new  lease 
of  tyrannous  exaction  which  has  to  be  put  down 
in  its  turn  by  law  for  the  sake  of  vindicating  the 
Free-Will  of  the  individual. 

Such  is,  then,  tiie  bitter  dualism  into  which 
modern  Society  in  its  negative  movement  is  con- 
stantly falling.  Neither  the  Social  Individual 
nor  the  Social  Whole  can  be  entrusted  with  the 
duty  of  actualizing  social  freedom,  which  is  the 
great  end  of  all  human  association.  Each  will 
tyrannize  over  the  other  if  it  gets  the  chance, 
and  thus  we  witness  that  everlasting  see-saw  be- 
tween labor   and   capital,  which  has  become  the 

17* 


l'58  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

t}^ical  fact  of  the  present  social  world.  It  is 
no  wonder  that  many  attempts  are  made  to  cure 
the  trouble,  or  even  to  get  rid  of  the  couflict  by 
getting  rid  of  both  sides  in  their  present  form. 

The  Social  Individual  being  defeated  and  put 
down  inside  the  Social  "Whole,  will  in  many 
cases  submit ;  but  in  other  cases  he  will  proceed 
to  build  a  new  Society  outside  the  Social  "Whole 
and  in  opposition  to  its  movement.  As  the 
Social  Individual  and  the  Social  Whole  have  both 
failed  to  secure  the  social  good,  and  have  ended 
in  tyranny,  both  are  to  be  deprived  of  their 
power  and  transformed ;  the  new  Social  "Whole 
is  to  eliminate  the  middleman  and  his  pursuit  of 
wealth,  while  the  new  Social  Individual  is  to 
abjure  his  social  freedom  and  be  directed  by  the 
Social  "Whole  immediately  in  his  labor.  Thus 
Societ}^  is  wheeled  about  and  made  to  move  in 
just  the  opposite  direction  to  its  course  hitherto ; 
it  is  inverted,  or  rather  perverted  from  its  insti- 
tutional end.  This  important  stage  of  Negative 
Society  is  worthy  of  a  careful  and  prolonged 
look. 

III.  Perverted  Society.  A  new  society  rises 
against  Societj^  a  social  institution  whose  object 
is  to  supplant  or  destroy  the  Social  Institution. 
Or  such  a  doctrine  is  affirmed  and  attempts  are 
made  to  carry  it  out.  But  what  element  of  So- 
ciety shall  be  eliminated,  what  be  made  the  basis 
of  the  new  society? 


SOCIETY.  2o9 

The  Social  Whole  must  be  ordered  now  in 
some  form  that  it  may  control  the  individual. 
While  recoo-nizing  his  wants,  it  is  to  assign  him 
his  task.  In  some  manner  or  other  Society  must 
make  every  person  will  the  whole,  and  take 
away  the  pursuit  of  gain,  of  individual  striving. 
As  at  present  constituted,  Society  is  the  arena  of 
individual  self -exploitation ;  this  must  be  cut  off 
in  a  new  order. 

Of  course  such  a  Society  turns  about  the  very 
end  of  the  existent  Society,  hence  we  call  it  per- 
verted. Ordinarily  Society  is  just  that  Institu- 
tion which  is  to  mediate  human  want,  not  to 
destroy  or  even  limit  it.  Any  want  can  be  grati- 
fied, provided  it  be  done  through  the  Institution. 
Satisfaction  of  wants  Society  is  not  to  curb,  if 
the  man  earns  or  inherits  the  fortune  he  is 
spending. 

Accordingly,  a  new  social  form  is  called  into 
existence,  or  at  least  is  theoretically  set  forth, 
whose  object  is  to  displace  the  old  social  form 
which  has  unfolded  with  the  ages.  These  two 
social  forms  are  in  essential  respects  the  oppo- 
sites  of  each  other,  and  this  opposition  turns 
chiefly  upon  the  individual  ownership  of  property. 

The  new  social  form  seeks  to  construct  an  in- 
stitution and  to  endow  it  with  an  authority  which 
assigns  to  the  individual  his  end  in  the  Social 
Whole,  directing  and  controlling  his  effort  not 
to  his  end,  but  to  its  end.     Thus  it  aims  at  the 


260  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

absolute  socialization  of  man  as  against  his  per- 
sonal pursuits,  especially  that  of  wealth.  His 
purpose  in  life  and  his  career  are  determined  from 
the  outside  by  the  Social  Whole  which  is  the  sole 
owner  and  distributer. 

Manifestly  the  new  Institution,  in  seeking  to 
save  the  individual  from  poverty  and  to  bring- 
about  social  equality,  has  destroyed  freedom. 
In  order  to  nullify  selfishness,  it  has  nullified 
selfhood;  if  the  social  individual  is  liberated 
from  the  oppression  of  the  middleman,  he  is,  on 
the  other  hand,  enslaved  to  the  Social  Whole, 
which  is  now  the  universal  capitalist,  and  cer- 
tainly can  become  just  as  tyrannical  as  the  indi- 
vidual capitalist,  while  to  escape  from  it  is  more 
diflicult. 

The  idea  or  the  scheme  of  this  new  social  form 
is  usually  called  sociaUsm,  as  its  whole  stress  lies 
upon  the  socialization  of  man.  The  term  social- 
ism, however,  is  very  indefinite  and  is  applied  to 
many  diverse,  in  fact  to  quite  all  phases  of  social 
transformation.  Certain  functions  performed  by 
modern  governments,  as  the  mail  service,  are  of- 
ten called  socialistic.  The  tendency  of  the  State 
at  the  present  time  toward  ownership  of  railroads, 
telegraphs,  etc.,  is  usually  designated  as  a  social- 
istic tendency.  Many  impro^'ements  which  have 
as  their  end  the  security  of  the  individual  and  his 
rights  are  classed  under  the  very  general  name  of 
socialism. 


SOCIETY.  261 

Evidently  there  are  two  main  kinds  of  social- 
ism, one  positive  and  one  negative,  one  of  which 
affirms  the  existent  social  order  and  endeavors  to 
carry  it  forward  in  the  line  of  its  normal  devel- 
opment, while  the  other  seeks  to  overturn  it,  or 
perchance  to  tm'n  it  round  and  make  it  flow  just 
in  the  opposite  direction.  This  would  be  Society 
not  only  diverted  but  perverted,  made  to  face 
about  and  go  the  other  way,  and  do  and  be  just 
the  other  of  itself.  In  socialism,  then,  we  be- 
hold the  two  great  tendencies,  the  evolutionary 
and  the  revolutionary  —  the  one  co-operating 
with  Society  as  now  historically  developed,  the 
latter  wheeling  it  around  toward  the  opposite 
goal  and  thereby  making  a  wholly  new  institution, 
or  trj'ing  to  do  so. 

Moreover,  the  fact  again  comes  to  light  that 
perversion  is  also  a  reversion,  quite  as  we  saw  in 
the  case  of  the  Family.  The  new  social  form, 
when  looked  into  with  historical  eyes,  is  found  to 
be  in  many  respects  one  of  the  oldest  of  social 
forms,  which  Society  as  a  whole  has  transcended, 
even  if  it  must  now  and  then  go  back  and  take  a 
dip  in  its  earliest  fountain.  The  socialistic  ideal 
has  its  likeness  to  the  primitive  Village  Com- 
munity which  assigned  to  the  individual  member 
his  share  of  the  common  produce,  or  his  lot  for 
tillage  out  of  the  common  lands. 

In  the  present  account  of  Perverted  Society  we 
intend  to  d(>al  with  the  negative  or  revolutionary 


262  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

phase  of  socialism ;  the  evolutionary  phase  will 
be  considered  later.  The  supreme  object  of  this 
sort  of  socialism  is  to  construct  asocial  system  of 
its  own,  at  whose  disposal  it  places  the  social  indi- 
vidual, in  order  to  rescue  him  from  the  tyranny  of 
the  middleman.  The  difficulty  here  lies  at  hand. 
This  new  Society  must  be  administered  by  an  in- 
dividual, who  can,  in  his  turn,  become  a  tyrant 
and  rouse  hostility.  Thus,  socialism  is  always, 
when  at  the  point  of  realization,  also  at  the  point 
of  self -dissolution ;  it  puts  one  tyranny  in  the 
place  of  another. 

The  phenomena  of  revolutionary  socialism 
(in  the  sense  just  given)  arrange  themselves  in 
distinct  groups,  which  shade  into  one  another, 
but  which  can  be  marked  distinctly  in  their  gen- 
eral outline  as  well  as  in  their  fundamental 
thought.  There  is,  first,  what  is  usually  called 
Communism,  w^hich  word,  however,  we  shall  re- 
serve for  a  more  pressing  need  as  well  as  for  a 
more  fitting  place ;  this  stage  we  shall  here  name 
Communistic  Socialism.  Its  members  usually 
form  a  peaceful,  retired  non-combative  com- 
munity, seeking  rather  a  primitive  idyllic  exist- 
ence than  a  militant  i)ropagandism  of  their  doc- 
trine. For  the  most  part  this  sort  of  sociahsm 
has  a  religious  origin  and  keeps  up  its  religious 
character.  Quite  the  opposite  is  the  second  sort 
of  socialism,  which  we  shall  call  Industrial  So- 
cialism,   and  which  at  present  is  the  dominant 


SOCIETY.  2G3 

school.  It  is  not  retiring,  but  aggressive,  on 
the  whole  anti-religious,  materialistic,  sensuous, 
determined  to  get  and  to  swallow  its  share  of  good 
things  of  this  world.  It  cultivates  chiefly  the 
proletariate  endeavoring  to  weld  this  class  into  a 
social  unit  by  itself,  which  will  be  strong  enough 
to  take  possession  (peaceably  if  it  can,  forcibly 
if  it  must)  not  only  of  other  classes  of  society 
but  of  all  institutions  (Marx).  Very  easily  does 
this  pass  over  into  the  third  kind  of  socialism 
known  as  Nihilism,  in  which  the  present  negative 
movement  winds  itself  up  in  the  destruction  of 
all  institutions,  secular  and  religious. 

Some  remarks  will  be  devoted  to  expanding 
these  three  socialistic  groups,  all  of  them  revolu- 
tinary,  yet  in  different  ways. 

1.  Communistic  Socialism.  Most  of  the  com- 
munistic societies  of  the  world  have  had  their 
origin  in  religion.  Indeed  the  religious  con- 
sciousness has  an  element  of  communism  in  its 
very  nature.  The  fatherhood  of  God  must  have 
as  its  corollary  the  brotherhood  of  man,  and  this 
brotherhood  is  to  be  realized  in  an  institution 
whose  members  share  everything  equally  like 
brothers.  The  earliest  Christian  society,  that  of 
the  disciples,  was  communistic,  and  this  example 
has  often  been  cited  and  followed  by  bodies  of 
men  and  women.  From  the  bejjinnincr  of  Chris- 
tianity  down  to  the  present  this  phase  has  never 
(juite  lapsed,  and  at  times  breaks  out  with  sudden 


264  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

fervor.  Saint  Simon  called  his  chief  work  the 
"  New  Christianity,"  and  started  into  life  the 
modern  socialistic  agitation  of  France.  But  the 
grand  arena  for  communistic  experiments  has 
been  America,  where  was  abundance  of  land,  and 
no  interference  from  Church  or  State  or  People 
unless  roused  by  moral  violation.  An  account 
of  these  has  been  given  by  Nordhoff  in  his  Com- 
munistic Societies  of  the  United  States.  These 
are  attempts  at  putting  an  ideal  social  condition 
into  livnnof  realitv.  In  contrast  Avitli  them  we 
must  mention  two  most  famous  communistic 
schemes  which  have  remained  purely  ideal,  but 
which  have  had  a  deep  influence  upon  men's 
minds  in  the  present  direction.  One  is  ancient, 
Plato's  Republic;  the  other  is  modern,  More's 
Utopia;  neither  of  them  is  distinctively  religious, 
but  social  and  political. 

1.  The  communistic  Society  is  based  pri- 
marily upon  the  community  of  goods  as  its  dis- 
tinctive social  principle,  which,  as  before  said,  is 
general  1}'-  enforced  by  religious  sanctions.  Its 
natural  home  is  in  the  country,  and  its  natural 
vocation  is  agriculture.  It  belongs  to  a  simple- 
hearted  folk  who  love  peace,  a  certain  degree  of 
seclusiveness,  and  their  own  religious  commun- 
ings. The  question  has  been  asked  whether  the 
members  of  such  a  community  will  do  their  full 
quota  of  work,  as  the  motive  of  self-interest  is 
absent.     They   are   certainly  not  the  people  to 


SOCIETY.  266 

develop  the  resources  of  a  great  country,  though 
they  are  industrious  and  honest  and  frugal. 

2.  When  it  conies  to  the  Family  there  is  great 
variation  in  the  attitude  of  the  different  associa- 
tions. Some  have  a  community  of  wives,  or 
what  the  Oneida  Society  calls  complex  marriage. 
Others  have  no  wives  at  all,  as  the  Shakers,  but 
remain  celibates,  recruiting  their  numbers  by 
converts  and  by  adopting  poor  children.  Still 
others  limit  marriage  and  place  it  under  various 
restrictions.  Then  'again  there  are  attempts  to 
limit  the  number  of  children  after  marriage.  In 
many  of  them  a  religious  tone  exists  which  dis- 
courages matrimony,  holding  it  to  be  less  con- 
sistent with  the  divine  will  than  celibacy.  Most 
of  this  proceeds  doubtless  from  the  imitation  of 
early  Christian  example  as  set  forth  in  the  New 
Testament,  which,  as  we  have  already  seen,  is 
not  especially  favorable  to  the  Family.  On  the 
whole,  therefore,  communistic  socialism  must  be 
pronounced  to  be  quite  uncertain  about  itself  in 
regard  to  the  domestic  institution. 

3.  In  regard  to  the  State  the  communistic 
society  finds  itself  in  a  condition  of  passive  an- 
tagonism. Indeed  if  its  principles  were  univer- 
sally carried  out,  they  would  overthrow  the 
government  of  any  country  probably,  certainly 
that  of  the  United  States.  For  the  communistic 
society  is  necessarily  a  despotism,  however  mild 
this  mav  bo.     Savs  Mr.  Nordhoff :  "  The  funda- 


266  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

mental  principle  of  communal  life  is  the  subordi- 
nation of  the  individual  will  to  the  general  interest 
or  the  general  will;  practically  this  takes  the 
shape  of  unquestioning  obedience  of  the  members 
toward  the  elders  or  chiefs  of  their  society." 
Thus  we  see  something  like  the  old  patriarchate 
w'ith  its  absolute  authority. 

Such  a  community  is  therefore,  revolutionary, 
though  peaceful  and  non-resistent.  It  is  a  society 
which  rises  up  inside  Society  against  Society.  It 
seeks  not  to  overturn  by  open  violence  or  by 
secret  machination,  still  it  aims  at  the  grand 
social  overturn.  A  free  State  tolerates  this  oppo- 
sition to  itself  as  a  religious  or  social  conviction. 
But  such  a  community  is  none  the  less  negative 
to  the  universal  social  order  of  man  as  this  has 
developed  itself  up  to  date.  Hence  it  is  to  be 
set  down  as  a  form  of  Perverted  Society,  whose 
first,  most  immediate,  most  implicit  stage  it  is, 
often  quite  unconscious  of  itself  and  of  its  own 
perversion. 

Moreover  we  should  note  that  the  present  per- 
version is  likewise  a  reversion.  We  shall  soon 
have  occasion  to  speak  of  the  Village  Community 
as  a  phase  of  primitive  society,  almost  whollj' 
agricultural,  communistic  as  to  land,  often  acting 
despotically  toward  the  individual,  a  marvelous 
prototype  of  the  modern  institution  which  we 
have  just  been  describing.  Thus  we  shall  see 
that  this  primordial  social  unit  often  reproduces 


SOCIETY.  267 

itself,  especially  in  a  simple  rural,  unadvanced 
population,  alongside  of  the  social  forms' of  the 
latest  civilization. 

Such  are,  in  general,  the  social,  domestic  and 
political  relations  of  these  communistic  societies, 
which  necessarily  are  revealed  in  their  dealings 
with  Property,  Family,  and  State.  They  have, 
moreover,  a  tendency  to  inner  disintegration, 
their  number  and  their  membership  have  dimin- 
ished in  the  United  States.  They  cannot  stand 
civilization  any  more  than  can  the  Indian,  who 
also  lives  in  a  primitive  Village  Community, 
which,  however,  is  not  a  reversion,  but  is  original. 
The  cause  of  dissolution  is  usually  the  absolute 
authority  of  the  patriarchate  which  drives  off 
many  of  the  younger  members  who  will  not  en- 
dure the  suppression  of  their  individuality.  It 
is  the  spirit  of  young  America  that  breaks  down 
the  communal  principle,  or  quits  it  for  a  free 
career  in  the  outside  world. 

The  next  step  is  that  socialism  will  enter  just 
the  realm  of  modern  civilization,  from  which  it 
shrank  in  the  communistic  society.  Out  of  its 
narrow,  self-sufficient  life  in  the  country,  where 
wants  w^ere  essentially  limited  to  and  satisfied  by 
the  community,  we  now  behold  socialism  ste})ping 
forth  into  the  very  center  of  the  industrial  arena 
of  the  most  advanced  peoples. 

2.  Industrial  Socialism.  Thus  we  name  the 
present    j^hnse,    roughly    indicating   thereby    i(s 


268  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

general  character  as  well  as  its  origin.  It  belongs 
to  the  city  rather  than  to  the  country,  springs  up 
in  the  manufacturing  class  rather  than  in  the 
agricultural ;  it  is  aggressive,  defiant,  for  peace 
or  war  according;  to  the  outlook.  It  seeks  the 
material  well-being  of  the  w^orkman,  and  believes 
chiefly  in  that.  Its  tendency,  on  the  whole, 
must  be  pronounced  to  be  antagonistic  to  religion, 
though  not  many  socialists  go  to  the  length  of 
the  socialist  Marr,  who  says:  "  The  idea  of  God 
is  the  kej^stone  of  a  perverted  civilization.  It 
must  be  destroyed.  The  true  root  of  liberty,  of 
equality,  of  culture,  is  Atheism"  (Cited  in  Hae, 
Contemporary/  Socialism,  p.  119).  This,  of 
course,  quite  touches  the  point  of  Nihilism. 

On  the  other  hand  it  should  be  mentioned  that 
there  is  or  has  been  an  active  body  of  propagand- 
ists who  call  themselves  Christian  Socialists. 
Two  parties  under  this  name  have  arisen  in  Ger- 
many, one  of  Catholic  origin  (Bishop  Ketteler) 
and  the  other  of  Protestant  (Pastor  Todt).  In 
England  also  the  same  name  (Christian  Socialists) 
was  applied  to  a  band  of  reformers  whose  leading 
spirit  was  Maurice.  Still  there  is  a  general 
agreement  of  opinion  that  the  Industrial  Social- 
ism of  the  present  is  not  religious  in  its  origin, 
character,  or  reverence.  Its  materialism  is  un- 
disguised, its  sensism  repels  most  people  who 
have  any  faith  in  the  Unseen. 

The  idea  of  socialism  in  its  industrial  phase  is 


SOCIETY.  269 

a  collective  capital  belonging  to  the  Social  Whole, 
employed  for  production  through  labor,  and  dis- 
tributed equitably  to  the  producer  (who  is  the 
laborer),  by  the  Social  Whole.  The  two  ex- 
tremes are  Production  and  Distribution ;  between 
the  two  lies  the  Social  Whole,  which  is  both 
owner  and  distributer,  taking  the  place  of  the 
middleman  in  exploiting  the  laborer,  owning  the 
capital,  and  distributing  the  product.  The  So- 
cial Whole  thus  becomes  the  all-dominating 
factor,  with  its  centralized  capital  and  equally 
centralized  authority  over  both  production  and 
distribution.  Says  Schafle  in  his  book,  The 
Quinf essence  of  Socialism,  probably  the  clearest 
account  of  this  complicated  subject:  "The 
Alpha  and  Omega  of  socialism  is  the  transforma- 
tion of  private  competing  capitals  into  a  united 
collective  capital,"  which  is  to  be  wholly  man- 
ipulated by  the  socialistic  unit. 

Just  here  lies  the  overwhelming  difficulty  in 
the  scheme  of  socialism.  It  is  evident  that  the 
Social  Whole,  with  this  socialistic  burden  upon 
it,  will  have  a  task  many  times  greater  than  that 
of  any  government  which  ever  existed.  Its 
administrator,  however  appointed,  will  have  a 
power  more  searching,  more  absolute  over  the 
individual  than  any  other  monarch  of  Europe, 
not  excepting  the  Tsar  of  Russia.  Its  horde  of 
officials  will  constitute  an  army,  the  like  of  which 
has  never  been  seen  at  any  time  in  any  country 


270  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIONS. 

of  the  world.  In  fact,  no  socialist  has  ever  ap- 
proachingly  solved  this  phase,  the  political  phase, 
of  the  problem. 

Industrial  Socialism  has  become  an  historical 
fact  reaching  quite  through  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, and  the  best  wav  of  grasping  its  movement 
is  to  look  at  its  history.  It  has  swept  through 
the  three  leading  countries  of  Europe —  England. 
France  and  Germany,  in  the  order  of  time,  and 
with  special  developments  in  each  case.  Still, 
all  three  reveal  one  spirit,  which  takes  its  origin 
in  an  industrial  civilization. 

1.  We  shall  begin  with  England,  in  which 
country  industrialism  first  fully  developed  itself, 
and  also  the  philosophy  of  it  in  the  old  Pohtical 
Economy.  The  first  organizing  socialist  was 
Robert  Owen  (1771-1858),  born  in  Wales,  man- 
ager of  a  cotton  mill  in  Manchester,  England, 
manufacturer  and  philanthropist  at  New  Lanark, 
Scotland,  founder  of  a  socialistic  settlement 
at  New  Harmony,  Indiana,  and  finally  propa- 
gandist of  socialism  in  London.  Owen  beo^an 
on  the  practical  side ;  he  had  the  full  round 
of  social  experience,  as  he  had  been  laborer, 
owner  and  capitalist,  and  then  reformer.  Thus 
he  had  the  whole  cycle  of  socialism  at  work  within 
him,  and  out  of  his  life  it  unfolds  more  than  out 
of  the  life  of  any  other  man.  He  was  the  most 
prolific  genius  in  the  organization  of  social  ideas, 
he  seems  to  have  contained  implicitly  the  entire 


SOCIETY.  271 

future  development  of  socialism.  According  to 
trustworthy  accounts  he  estabhshed  out  of  the 
most  degraded  human  elements  a  kind  of  labor- 
ers' paradise  at  New  Lanark ;  he  started  infant 
schools  lono^  before  the  kindergfarden  of  Froebel 
existed ;  he  was  the  chief  originator  of  the  fac- 
tory acts  of  the  English  Parliament,  which  have 
become  a  part  of  the  beneficent  legislation  of  all 
civilized  nations. 

On  the  whole,  Owen  is  the  most  interesting, 
and  in  himself  the  most  complete  figure  in  the 
history  of  socialism  though  he  has  strong  rivals. 
He  is  personally  the  embodiment  of  the  social- 
istic idea  centering  in  the  Social  Whole  which  is 
to  look  after  the  laborer  and  even  the  laborer's 
children,  which  is  to  conduct  the  business  of  a 
vast  organization  with  supreme  administrative 
ability,  and  which  is  to  assign  justly  to  everyone 
the  fruits  of  his  labor.  All  these  talents  Owen 
possessed  and  practically  exercised ;  he  was  the 
veritable  incarnation  of  the  total  socialistic  pro- 
cess. Socialists  after  him  will  be  laborers,  agi- 
tators, theorists,  separately;  but  no  one  will 
represent  the  great  central  fact,  as  well  as  prime 
difficulty  of  socialism,  the  administration  of  the 
unified  social  Whole,  as  did  Robert  Owen. 

The  latter  part  of  his  life  was  not  successful. 
His  strength  lay  in  the  practical  field  which  he 
quit  for  the  theoretical,  venting  his  negative 
opinions  on   religion  and  on  the  family  and  on 


272  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIONS. 

other  matters  quite  outside  of  the  true  bent  of 
his  genius.  The  result  was,  he  lost  his  prestige 
and  almost  his  good  name,  so  that  he  has  hardlj 
yet  received  due  credit  for  his  wonderful  fertility 
of  thought.  Then  his  literary  expression  was 
inadequate;  though  he  wrote  a  good  deal,  he  has 
left  no  epoch-making  book.  He  probably  gave 
to  Marx  the  idea  of  surplus  value,  which  is  the 
central  principle  of  Marx'  famous  book  Das  Kap- 
ital.  At  least  the  idea  is  said  to  be  fullj'  stated, 
with  the  socialistic  consequences  drawn  from  it, 
in  some  of  Owen's  eavXy  writings. 

2.  French  socialism  of  the  present  century  is 
to  be  chiefly  ascribed  to  the  theories  of  Saint 
Simon  (1760-1825)  whose  influence  culminated 
some  years  after  that  of  Owen,  though  the 
latter  was  the  younger  man.  Saint  Simon's 
socialism  is  theoretical  at  the  start ;  it  begins 
with  books,  not  with  deeds,  wherein  he  stands 
in  contrast  with  Owen,  who  made  his  ideas  real 
before  he  expounded  them  to  any  extent  in  writ- 
ing. The  school  of  Saint  Simon  was  mainly 
composed  of  highly  educated  and  learned  men 
who  elaborated  and*  propagated  the  sj^stem  of 
their  master.  Much  practical  fruit  it  never  bore ; 
it  remained  an  idea,  or  more  often  a  sentiment 
Avhich  stirred  the  hearts  of  impressionable  French- 
men with  benevolence,  as  its  leading  doctrine 
was  that  "  the  end  of  all  Societ}'^  was  the  ameli- 
oration of  the  poorest  class."     Louis  Blanc  felt 


SOCIETY.  273 

this  practical  inadequacy  and  wrote  his  Organiz- 
ation du  Travail  for  the  purpose  of  rousing 
French  socialists  to  strive  for  practical  results 
which  he  tried  to  bring  about  by  establishing  his 
social  workshops. 

Saint  Simon  belonged  to  the  old  nobility  of 
France,  and  his  socialism  is  largely  the  result  of 
a  reaction  against  the  individualistic  tendencies 
of  the  French  Revolution.  Still  he  does  not  pro- 
pose to  go  back  to  the  old  feudal  regime,  but  to 
advance  to  the  new  order  which  is  the  socialistic. 
His  ideas  have  had  a  great  influence  upon  a  cer- 
tain class  of  ardent  minds,  and  upon  French 
workmen  in  the  large  manufacturing  centers. 
But  the  French  peasant  is  the  unshaken  foe  of 
socialism  with  its  supposed  attempt  to  get  his  few 
acres  of  land,  which  he  loves;  for  the  same 
reason  he  hates  the  old  monarchy  with  its  feud- 
alism, from  which  during  the  Revolution  he 
wrenched  his  little  estate.  Hence  these  millions 
of  peasants  with  their  adherents  support  the 
present  French  Republic  and  have  given  to  it  an 
unexpected  stability,  as  they  regard  it  their  bul- 
wark ag-ainst  feudalism  on  the  one  side  and  so- 
cialism  on  the  other.  The  system  of  the  socialist 
Fourier  had  also  some  adherents  in  France,  and 
in  other  countries,  but  its  influence  was  by  no 
means  equal  to  that  of  Saint  Simon's  work. 
Sociahsm,  notwithstanding  the  stir  it  has  made 
in  Paris,  Lyons  and  some  other  large  towns,  has 
18 


274  SOCIAL  INSTITUTION'S. 

never  gotten  political  possession  of  France,  nor 
will  it,  in  the  present  attitude  of  the  French 
peasantry  and  landed  proprietors. 

French  Socialism,  at  least,  in  its  earlier  form, 
may  be  said  to  h:ive  spent  itself  in  the  Parisian 
Revolution  of  1848.  In  the  Fifties  it  was  qui- 
escent, if  not  moribund,  though  it  still  had  its 
fervent  disciples.  English  socialism  was  at 
this  period  in  a  similar  condition.  But  in  the 
sixties  socialism  passed  to  the  third  great  Euro- 
pean nation,  in  which  it  was  destined  to  celebrate 
its  proudest  trium})!!  and  to  find  its  most  influen- 
tial writers.  This  was  Germany.  A  man  arose 
equally  gifted  in  theory  and  practice,  equally 
ready  for  speculation  and  action,  though  he  Avas 
anything  but  a  son  of  toil,  like  Owen.  Indeed 
he  Avas  a  gilded  son  of  pleasure  while  organizing 
German  labor. 

3.  Such  was  the  wonderful  phenomenon  named 
Ferdinand  Lassalle,  whom  A  exander  von  Hum- 
boldt baptized  as  Z)«.s'  Wunderldnd.  He  was  the 
founder  of  German  socialism  and  established  its 
apostolate,  which  has  sent  forth  nniny  enthusiastic 
and  persistent  disciples,  who  have  kept  the  cause 
flourishing  in  Germany  and  have  propagated  it  in 
the  other  parts  of  the  world. 

Lassalle  was  succeeded  by  a  greater  man  than 
himself,  though  not  a  greater  genius,  Karl  Marx. 
The  latter  is  verily  t';e' prophet  of  Industrial  So- 
cialism, having  written  what  has  been  called  the 


SOCIETY.  275 

Bible  of  the  German  workingman,  who  has,  in- 
deed, to  a  large  extent  cast  off  the  other  Hebrew- 
Bible.  It  is  a  surprising  fact  that  both  Lassalle 
and  Marx,  the  great  apostles  of  the  native  Ger- 
man proletariate,  were  born  Jews,  with  the  ad- 
vantages of  a  University  education  and  of  parental 
property.  One  is  inclined  to  see  in  their  social- 
istic absolutism  a  strain  of  the  Oriental  conscious- 
ness, if  not  a  reversion  to  Hebrew  paternalism. 
At  any  rate  both  are  bitter  enemies  of  the  modern 
political  freedom  of  the  individual,  which  is  an 
evolution  of  European  races  as  distinct  froui  the 
Asiatic.  With  Marx  especially  all  Institutions, 
State,  Church,  and  Family  also  largely  are  swal- 
lowed up  in  the  one  social  Institution,  whose 
great  end  is  to  secure  an  increased  material  sub- 
sistence to  the  laborer.  A  kind  of  pantheistic 
absorption  of  the  individual  into  the  all  devour- 
ing Social  Whole  is  the  main  article  of  the 
new  faith  which  is  to  supersede  all  need  of  pat- 
riotism or  religion.  It  was  the  natural  outcome 
of  Marx'  doctrine  and  probably  of  his  birth  that 
he  could  found  the  so-called  International,  hav- 
ing little  sympathy  with  the  National  in  any 
form. 

This  brings  us  to  say  a  few  words  about  Marx' 
leading  idea  which  is  that  of  "surplus  value," 
whose  meaning  is,  that  while  labor  is  the  source 
of  all  value,  the  laborer  gets  only  enough  of  this 
value  to  pay  for  the  bare  subsistence  of  himself 


27r.  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

and  his  family,  the  surphis  going  into  the  pockets 
of  the  capitalist.  The  "  surplus  value  "  of  the 
product,  which  in  justice  belongs  to  the  laborer 
producing  it,  is  appropriated  under  the  present 
system  by  the  middleman.  This  is,  in  fact,  the 
generating  idea  of  all  industrial  socialism,  and 
was  distinctly  seen  and  formulated  by  Owen  and 
his  followers.  The  capitalist  or  middleman  robs 
the  laborer  of  his  just  share  of  the  common  prod- 
uct through  the  system  of  wages,  which  makes 
the  workingman  himself  a  commodity,  a  thing 
bought  and  sold  in  the  labor-market,  a  wage- 
slave  as  he  now  often  calls  himself,  in  distinction 
from  the  land-slave  or  serf,  and  from  the  body- 
slave.  For  "  the  iron  law  of  wages  "  binds  him 
in  its  fetters,  giving  him  barely  enough  to  repro- 
duce himself,  first  in  the  physical  sustenance  of 
his  own  body,  then  in  that  of  his  children,  who 
are  to  furnish  the  future  labor-market  with  wage- 
slaves  for  capital.  To  this  inner  pressure  comes 
the  outer  war  of  competition  between  the  middle- 
men themselves,  into  whose  fluctuations  the 
laborer  is  necessarily  drawn  and  suffers. 

The  doctrine  that  labor  is  the  source  of  value 
is  derived  from  Adam  Smith  and  especially  from 
Ricardo,  and  thus  Marx  has  forced  the  old  ortho- 
dox Political  Economy  of  England  into  socialism, 
which  fact  has  been  one  cause  of  its  recent  dis- 
credit. The  sensism  of  Marx  shows  itself  in  his 
ascribing  all  value   to  the  brawn  of  the  laborer 


SOCIETY.  277 

and  little  or  none  to  the  brain  of  middleman,  the 
undertaker  and  executor  of  great  business  enter- 
prises which  employ  labor.  Yet  Marx  springs 
intellectually  from  the  idealist  Hegel,  whose 
negative  dialectic  he  uses  with  commanding  skill, 
but  whose  positive  institutional  element  he  not 
only  ignores  but  destroys.  Lassalle  w^as  also  in 
his  early  career  a  follower  of  Hegel. 

Many  reasons  have  been  assigned  why  socialism 
takes  no  deep  hold  upon  Anglo-Saxon  peoples. 
It  has  been  imported  into  America  by  German 
immigrants,  but  has  a  tendency  to  die  out  in  the 
second  generation.  On  the  whole  the  native 
American  can  sec  in  pure  socialism  little  hope  of 
social  salvation,  though  he  is  ready  to  accept, 
and  is  getting  ready  to  apply  practically  certain 
ideas  often  called  socialistic,  such  as  the  mu- 
nicipal ownership  of  some  kinds  of  public  service. 
But  the  massive  political  burden  of  universal 
socialism  he  refuses  to  take  upon  himself,  since 
he,  as  a  voter,  is  ultimately  the  law-maker  and 
ruler.  Hence  he  feels  his  own  political  responsi- 
bility, which  he  cannot  throw  off  upon  an  abso- 
lute government  in  which  he  has  no  hand.  The 
German,  trained  under  a  system  of  paternalism, 
seems  to  think  that  the  State  can  do  anything, 
can  introduce  the  socialistic  scheme  by  fiat.  Few 
Americans,  owing  to  their  political  experience  in 
self-government,  entertain  any  such  delusion. 
They  have  already  trouble  enough  in  keeping  the 


278  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

administration  of  city  and  State  in  fair  condi- 
tion, and  they  are  wary  of  adding  to  the  diffi- 
culty. Still  there  is  little  doubt  that  certain 
thoughts,  which  have  been  thrown  up  to  the 
surface  by  the  socialistic  agitation,  are  having 
and  will  continue  to  have  an  influence  upon  Amer- 
ican legislation. 

3.  JSfihUism.  We  have  now  reached  the  last 
phase  of  this  negative  movement  of  Society,  in 
which  the  negation  becomes  completely  explicit, 
frankly  proclaiming  its  own  character  and  nam- 
ing itself  accordingl3\  Men  have  come  to  the 
point  of  associating  in  order  to  destroy  all  forms 
of  association  as  these  exist  at  present ;  the  very 
fact  of  their  being  shows  that  they  ought  not  to 
be.  A  society  of  Nihilists  must,  of  course,  soon 
annihilate  itself. 

The  doctrine  is  different  from  Socialism  (in 
the  sense  here  used),  but  easily  and  indeed  na- 
turally springs  out  of  it  by  abstracting  its  neg- 
ative side  and  making  the  same  the  end.  The 
direct  object  of  Nihilism  is  to  destroy  the  social 
Whole,  not  to  transform  it  by  peaceful  means. 
The  institution  is  to  be  abolished,  the  mediation 
of  human  wants  through  Society  is  declared  to 
be  tyranny,  hostile  to  man's  Free  Will,  which  is 
to  exist  only  in  its  immediate  form  and  not  in- 
stitutionally. This  is  the  complete  reversion  to 
the  state  of  violence,  wherein  we  see  a  return  to 
the  purest  individualism.     Here  Nihilism  becomes 


SOCIETY.  279 

the  opposite  of  Socialism,  though  it  too  can  only 
end  in  the  domination  of  the  strongest.  Thus 
Socialism  is  devoured  by  its  own  child. 

One  country  in  Europe  has  been  the  chief  scene 
of  Nihilism,  Eussia.  It  exists  in  all  lands,  but 
it  has  specially  thriven  among  Slavonic  peoples. 
Teutonic  socialism,  passing  over  the  border  to 
the  East,  became  Eussian  Kihilism.  The  Strang- 
est  fact  about  it  is  that  it  traces  its  intellectual 
origin  to  Hegel's  philosophy,  which  early  split 
into  two  main  divisions  (often  said  to  be  three), 
the  positive  and  the  negative.  The  negative 
Hegelians,  usually  called  the  Hegelian  left,  de- 
veloped the  dialectical  side  of  Hegel  and  hurled 
it  remorselessly  against  all  existent  reality.  From 
the  German  universities  Russian  students  carried 
this  negative  Hegelianism  into  Russia,  and  applied 
its  destructive  criticism  to  the  social  and  political 
institutions  of  their  fatherland.  Stern  repres- 
sion followed,  which  met  wdth  obstinate  re- 
sistance, physical  and  intellectual;  out  of  the 
collision  Nihilism  has  developed,  practical  and 
theoretical. 

In  Germany,  we  may  here  add,  this  negative 
Hegelianism  ran  its  course  and  finally  negated  it- 
self, as  it  must,  but  at  the  same  time  it  destroyed 
the  Hegelian  philosophy,  almost  extirpating  this 
branch  of  study  from  the  German  Universities. 
Now  comes  another  curious  fact :  positive  Hegel- 
ianism has  taken  refuge  in  Anglo-Saxon  coun- 


280  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tries,  in  England  and  America,  where  it  is  much 
studied,  and  is  slowly  being  made  the  theoretical 
basis  of  just  that  institutional  world,  which  it,  on 
its  dialectical  side,  was  once  invoked  to  destroy. 
Such  are  the  two  opposing  streams  of  influence 
which  have  their  sources  in  the  great  German 
philosopher. 

Nihilism  has  passed  through  a  number  of  trans- 
formations. It  is  so  completeh'  dialectical  that 
it  is  liable  to  contradict  itself  at  any  point.  It  is 
necessarily  the  least  consistent  doctrine  which  it 
is  possible  for  man  to  hold.  For  Nihilism,  in  the 
very  assertion  of  itself  as  a  principle,  must  be 
annihilating  itself.  Its  self-realization  is  the  act 
of  self-destruction.  Some  of  its  fleeting  appear- 
ances we  may  gaze  at  for  a  moment. 

1.  Its  first  form  was  a  socialistic  Nihilism, 
whose  object  was  to  destroy  the  existent  social 
order,  and  upon  the  ruins  to  let  a  society  build 
itself,  whose  outlines  were  left  exceedingly  vague. 
The  immediate  object  was  social  destruction, 
which  might  be  accomplished  through  the  exist- 
ing government.  The  Russian  State  and  Social- 
ism had  a  very  important  principle  in  common, 
namely  absolutism.  The  Tsar  Alexander  II., 
who  annihilated  serfdom  and  other  social  rela- 
tions, was  himself  a  kind  of  an  imperial  Nihilist, 
who  perished  at  last  through  Nihilism.  Some 
say  that  he  is  the  main  source  of  Russian 
Nihilism;     certainly   it    had    its    chief   develop- 


SOCIETY.  281 

inent   durinsr   his    reiga    and    brought   it   to  an 
end. 

2.  The  government  of  Russia  prosecuted  the 
Nihilists  bitterly,  with  the  result  that  the  latter 
turned  upon  the  government  and  assailed  its  head 
in  a  series  of  plots  and  assassinations  which  have 
hardly  a  parallel  in  history.  These  horrors  in 
rapid  succession  sent  shiver  after  shiver  through 
the  whole  civilized  world,  and  the  crack  of  doom 
seemed  to  be  heard  over  Russia.  Thus  out  of 
the  socialistic  Nihilism  came  a  national  Nihilism 
which  sought  particularly  the  overthrow  of  Tsar- 
dom.  This  very  year  ( 1901)  we  read  of  renewed 
Nihilistic  activity  in  Russia. 

3.  Of  this  national  Russian  Nihilism  has  been 
born  a  new  offspring,  which  we  may  call  univer- 
sal Nihilism.  It  no  longer  confines  itself  to 
Russia,  but  has  propagated  itself  throughout 
Europe,  and  has  reached  America  along  with 
European  immigrants.  Strangely  the  Italian 
seems  to  be  most  deeply  affected  by  this  kind  of 
Nihilism,  and  is  constituting  himself  assassin  for 
the  world.  The  Russian  is  apparently  inclined  to 
keep  his  Nihilism  for  home  use,  though  he  be- 
comes its  missionary  to  other  lands.  The  great- 
est apostle  of  universal  Nihilism  was  a  Russian, 
the  famous  Bakunin,  who  spread  it  among  Latin 
l)eoples,  especially  among  Italians.  Though  he 
spurred  on  many  a  poor  devil  to  death  for  the 
cause,  he  himself  died  under  shelter,  with  skin 


282  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

whole,  at  Berne  in  1876.  Bakunin,  too,  in  early 
life  was  a  zealous  follower  of  Heo^el,  whose  nesra- 
tive  side  he  has  carried  out  more  completely  than 
any  other  disciple,  living  or  dead. 

The  doctrine  of  Bakunin  passed  through  sev- 
eral stages,  but  its  culmination  is  seen  in  his 
society  called,  "  The  Alliance  of  Socialist  Dem- 
ocracy," founded  in  1869.  In  its  programme 
this  "Alliance  declares  itself  atheistic,"  as  its 
starting-point;  then  "all  political  and  author- 
itative States  should  disappear,"  and  this  is 
to  be  accomplished  by  a  "universal  revolution, 
social,  philosophical,  political,  in  order  that  first 
in  Europe  and  then  in  the  rest  of  the  world  there 
may  not  remain  one  stone  upon  another  of  the 
existing  order  of  things."  Thus  Bakunin  has 
"universalized"  his  negation,  following  a  well- 
known  Hegelian  procedure,  of  course  after  his 
own  original  fashion,  which  in  this  extremity  was 
not  known  to  Hegel. 

So  much  for  the  doctrine ;  but  what  about  the 
organization  of  the  "  Alliance?"  It  was  prob- 
ably the  most  completely  centralized,  despotic, 
freedom-destroying  society  that  was  ever  con- 
ceived by  the  brain  of  man,  with  central  author- 
ity ultimately  in  Bakunin  himself,  though  this 
may  not  have  been  stated.  For  the  society  was 
secret,  not  only  secret  to  the  public  but  largely 
secret  to  the  general  members,  whose  chief  duty 
was   unquestioning  obedience    to  the  command 


SOCIETY.  288 

from  an  unknown  tribunal,  communicated  by  the 
one  authorized  person,  who  himself  did  not  know 
whence  came  the  command,  as  it  was  delivered 
to  him  by  a  third  person  equally  ignorant  of  its 
source.  But  how  was  this  interconnection  es- 
tablished? The  workino;  method  of  the  organi- 
zation  seems  not  yet  fully  known,  as  the  common 
member  is  the  one  who  is  deputed  to  do  the  dan- 
gerous work,  and  hence  he  is  the  one  who  gen- 
erally gets  caught.  But  he  properh'  knows  only 
of  his  own  little  circle  of  ten,  or,  if  he  be  its 
founder,  he  knows  of  two  circles.  Thus,  if  he 
confesses,  he  has  not  much  information  to  im- 
part. Herein  we  come  upon  a  leading  object  of 
the  central  organizization :  to  secure  itself  against 
confession  and  treachery.  Its  method  proceeds 
from  a  universal  suspicion  of  its  members,  and 
from  their  own  ignorance  and  credulity.  The 
central  circle  (originally  of  one  hundred  mem- 
bers) start  other  circles,  and  these  still  other 
circles ;  all  these  derived  circles  have  no  connec- 
tion with  one  another,  and  need  not  to  know  of 
one  another,  except  in  the  above-mentioned  case 
of  the  founder,  who  is  the  sole  connecting  link 
between  two  circles.  Yet  this  connecting  link  is 
everywhere  present,  and  forms  a  net-work  which 
joins  all  the  subordinate  circles  to  the  central  one, 
from  which  the  secret  command  can  be  trans- 
mitted to  every  individual  nihilist.  (See  the  ac- 
count in  Rae's  book,  Contemporary  Socialism.) 


284  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Such  is  the  society  which  has  secretly  formed 
itself  within  the  social  order  for  the  purpose  of 
destroying  the  social  order  and  indeed  the  whole 
institutional  world.  For  the  Nihilist  traces  all 
human  ills,  moral  and  physical,  to  institutions, 
and  so  establishes  an  institution  for  their  de- 
struction. Herein  what  we  have  called  Perverted 
Society  has  reached  its  climax  and  final  manifest- 
ation. 

Still  the  Nihilist  at  times  shows  signs  of  trying 
to  go  a  step  farther.  Nature  has  an  order,  a 
system  of  laws ;  why  should  he  not  become  their 
enemy  too?  Bakunin  speaks  of  the  great  end 
of  Nihilism  as  "  universal  amorphism,"  the  de- 
struction of  all  form,  which  would  seem  to  involve 
Nature,  who  is  the  great  producer  of  forms.  He 
says  that  the  Nihilist  is  to  study  physical  science, 
mechanics,  chemistry,  engineering,  not  in  order 
to  construct  anything  but  to  destroy,  apparently 
to  undo  Nature  herself  in  an  ultimate  grand 
cataclysm,  to  send  this  blooming  planet  whizzing 
back  to  chaos,  to  that  nebulous  streak  in  which 
Laplace  saw  our  globe  starting  on  its  career. 
Then  we  shall  have  attained,  as  nearly  as  pos- 
sible, the  goal  of  all  true  striving,  universal 
amorphism. 

In  such  utterances  one  can  hardly  help  finding 
traces  of  disease.  Some  Russian  writers  have 
declared  that  Nihilism  is  a  mental  malady  pecu- 
liar to  Russia,  a  national  epidemic  of  negation, 


SOCIETY.  285 

which  has  sprung  from  \^'estern  culture  takeu  up 
by  a  people  not  yet  able  to  assimilate  it,  and 
especially  from  the  study  of  philosophy  by  minds 
which  could  not  digest  it  healthily.  The  pathol- 
ogy of  Nihilism  in  general  affirms  it  to  be  a  disease 
of  education,  as  it  has  been  found  quite  impos- 
sible to  inoculate  the  vast  multitude  of  io-norant 
Russian  peasantry  with  its  virus.  Their  stupidity 
is  said  to  be  the  grand  bulwark  against  their 
becoming  "  degenerates." 

Universal  Nihilism  which  has  as  its  object  to 
destroy  all  institutions,  is  now  commonly  known 
under  the  name  of  anarchism.  The  world  of 
order  is  reduced  to  social  chaos,  the  institutional 
organism  is  dissolved  into  its  cellular  mass  of  in- 
dividual units,  all  in  a  struggle  with  one  another, 
for  their  negative  energy  is  just  what  they  have 
developed,  and  is  what  has  brought  them  to  the 
present  pass.  Such  is  the  ideal  picture  of  uni- 
versal negation. 

But  even  the  Nihilist  does  not  propose  to  re- 
main in  this  state  ;  he  too,  when  he  has  destroyed 
all,  is  going  to  turn  positive  and  construct  some- 
thing. But  what  annihilation  can  build,  has  not 
yet  been  revealed.  Nihilism  has  never  told,  or 
authoritatively  tried  to  tell,  what  it  was  going  to 
erect  after  the  grand  social  catastrophe. 

Fortunately  at  this  point  history  comes  to  the 
front  with  its  reality,  and  responds  to  the  pre- 
ceding downward  line  of   social  degeneration  by 


286  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

showing  a  continuous  upward  line  of  social  re- 
generation. In  thought  likewise  the  negative 
must  at  last  negate  itself,  which  is  the  very  pro- 
cess of  reahzation.  Accordingly  we  must  next 
see  our  Social  Whole,  after  being  driven  to  the 
extremity  of  its  descent,  wheel  about  and  rise  to 
its  present  development. 

III.  The  Evolution  of  Society. 

We  have  just  witnessed  the  outcome  of  the 
negative  movement  of  Society,  through  which 
man  is  reduced  to  his  individual  might  or  com- 
bines in  gangs  or  hordes  for  the  purpose  of  de- 
stroying the  Social  Whole.  Such  a  condition  is 
something  liise  what  is  often  called  the  state  of 
nature,  in  which  every  hand  is  raised  against 
every  other  hand  in  the  pursuit  of  physical  de- 
sire. The  civilized  world  is  resolved  back  into 
barbarism,  into  pure  individualism,  in  which  \io- 
lence  is  the  law. 

Such  negative  forces  are  at  present  existent  and 
working  in  Societ}^  and  not  infrequently  they 
rise  to  surface  and  give  everybody  a  shock  at  the 
outlook  which  they  logically  involve.  We  are 
all  compelled  to  take  a  peep  now  and  then  at 
the  universal  cataclysm  Avhich  seems  to  be  ap- 
proaching. A  strike  has  sometimes  stopped  all 
travel  and  cut  off  all  the  conveniences  of  life, 
so  that  the  Social  Whole  appears  to  be  dissolving 
into  its  original  atoms. 


SOCIETY.  287 

The  atomic  man,  as  he  begins  to  evolve  himself 
into  Society,  is  next  to  be  looked  at,  in  his  ascent 
from  his  primitive  condition.  For  the  Social 
Whole  is  found  to  have  an  ascending  current  as 
well  as  a  descending  one ;  it  has  overcome  all 
these  negative  elements  in  times  past,  and  has 
steadily  risen  to  its  present  development,  though 
some  societies  have  been  submerged  in  the  stream, 
and  all  societies  show  tendencies  at  certain  periods 
to  revert  to  former  and  lower  stages.  In  fact, 
there  is  always  in  every  society  an  element  of  re- 
version or  degeneracy,  an  element  which  seems 
unable  to  take  the  new  step  forward,  but  drops 
back  into  a  social  condition  already  transcended 
by  the  given  age.  This  negative  movement  we 
have  already  beheld  in  its  career  downwards  till 
it  reaches  what  we  called  Perverted  Society,  in 
which  the  social  end  is  destroyed  and  the  social 
man  drops  back  quite  to  his  starting-point.  Here, 
then,  Evolution  begins,  and  is  seen  mastering 
step  by  step  the  negative  stages  before  mentioned. 

The  Evohition  of  Society,  therefore,  is  the 
affirmative  answer  to  the  Revolution  of  Society, 
that  is,  the  answer  to  the  destructive  process 
tending  to  its  overthrow.  Evolution  appears  to 
have  just  come  in  time  to  vindicate  man  and  his 
Institutions,  and  to  restore  his  faith  in  his  own 
progress.  It  is  man's  return  to  himself,  his 
restoration  out  of  pessimism,  negation,  despair. 
Yet  we  must  see  that  Evolution  is  not  the  whole 


288  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

process,  but  a  part  thereof;  two  other  stages  go 
before  it,  of  which  it  is  the  completion. 

The  Evokition  of  Society  is,  accordingly,  the 
third  stage  of  the  grand  process  of  social  science, 
being  the  return  out  of  social  negation  to  the 
positive  principle  of  Society,  which  was  first  un- 
folded. The  reader  will  keep  in  mind  this  pro- 
cess of  the  social  totality  that  it  be  seized  not  as 
a  lot  of  chopped  up  abstractions,  but  as  the  liv- 
ing movement  of  the  subject  itself  in  its  creative 
energy.  Furthermore,  this  process  is  to  be  iden- 
tified with  that  of  the  Ego  itself,  which  is  here 
seen  producing  its  social  counterpart  —  the  social 
Ego  creating  the  social  Institution. 

In  like  manner  we  have  observed  this  process 
in  the  Family,  and  shall  observe  it  in  other  In- 
stitutions. For  the  Family  has  also  its  disinte- 
grating forces,  and  it  has  also  the  response  and 
counteraction  in  the  Evolution  of  the  Family, 
which  runs  parallel  with  the  Evolution  of  So- 
ciety. 

In  fact,  Society  and  Family  are  very  closely 
connected ;  in  the  beginning  Society  is  a  Family. 
Still  we  must  note  the  distinction  which  makes 
them  two  different  Institutions  in  their  develop- 
ment. The  Famihs  as  already  designated,  has 
its  ultimate  determining  end  in  the  reproduction 
of  the  Person  as  a  new  Free- Will  in  the  world. 
Society  has  as  its  ultimate  determining  end  the 
satisfaction    of    wants,  or    bodily  reproductibn. 


SOCIETY.  289 

which  is  to  be  accomplished  through  the  Social 
Whole.  The  individual  in  Society,  though  this 
be  limited  to  one  family,  has  needs  which  he  is 
to  satisfy  only  through  the  Institution,  to  which, 
however,  he  must  give  back  in  some  form  what 
he  takes.  Primarily  he  must  give  his  own  (pro- 
prium,  property),  for  what  he  receives. 

Thus  it  is  that  Property  may  be  deemed  the 
axis  of  Society,  whose  development  runs  parallel 
with  that  of  Property.  Ownership  is  what  moves 
through  Social  Evolution.  Is  what  you  have 
produced  yours?  Does  your  individual  Will,  ex- 
erting itself  in  production,  receive  its  equivalent 
through  the  existent  social  order?  If  it  does 
not,  there  must  be  a  change,  and  the  result  is  a 
development  of  the  Social  Institution  from  its 
earliest  to  its  latest  form. 

The  fact  comes  out  in  a  surprising  way  that 
ownership  does  not  belong  to  the  individual  in 
the  beginning,  but  to  the  Institution.  Pro})erty 
is  held  in  common,  and  is  employed  to  supply  the 
common  wants.  Nor  does  the  man's  activity 
(his  Will)  belong  to  himself,  but  to  the  Social 
Whole.  But  the  movement  is  to  make  Property 
individual,  to  break  up  social  ownership.  Then 
this  tendency  also  falls  iuto  an  excess,  so  that  a 
movement  sets  in  to  limit  individual  ownership 
and  to  return,  in  part,  at  least,  to  the  first  stage. 

As  just  outlined,  the  Evolution  of  Society  will 
pass  through  the  following  stages:  — 
19  , 


290  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIOXS. 

I.  Natural  Communism ;  Property  is  held  in 
common,  the  Individual  is  immediately  united 
with  the  Social  Whole,  to  which  belongs  what  he 
produces  and  from  which  he  receives  what  he 
needs.  Here  we  have  social  ownership  of  Prop- 
erty and  indeed  of  Man. 

II.  Individual  Ownership ;  this  is  the  stage  of 
separation  and  division;  man  separates  himself 
from  the  thing  and  makes  it  his  own,  individ- 
ually ;  that  which  was  common  Property  is  divided 
up  and  assigned  to  individuals,  who  are  now 
owners;  the  land,  being  just  the  fixed  and  stable 
in  its  nature,  is  usuulh^  the  last  to  be  divided. 
The  individual,  having  Property,  is  mediately 
connected  with  the  Social  Whole,  which  thereby 
assumes  a  different  character.  Moreover,  the 
individual  will  not  only  take  his  own,  but  wiU 
begin  to  appropriate  what  belongs  to  the  Social 
Whole  —  whence  a  new  movement. 

III.  Civic  Communism  (^institutional);  this 
will  show  a  return  to  social  or  communal  owner- 
ship in  things  produced  by  the  Social  Whole  and 
belonging  to  it  properly  rather  than  to  the  indi- 
vidual. It  is  a  resumption  of  a  lapsed  proprietary 
right  in  the  Commnnity,  while  recognizing  fully 
individual  ownership.  It  may  be  said  that  this 
is  the  social  process  which  is  at  the  present  time 
going  on  with  greater  intensity  than  any  other. 

Sometimes  this  last  stage  is  called  socialistic, 
but  the  term  socialism  is  properly  confined  to  the 


SOCIETY.  291 

scheDie  which  proposes  to  take  all  means  of  pro- 
duction for  and  into  the  Social  Whole,  and  thus 
do  away  with  individual  ownership.  Such  a  So- 
ciety has  never  existed,  and  there  is  a  Cjuestion 
if  it  can  exist.  But  the  Community  (with  its 
ow^nership  in  various  forms)  has  alwaj's  existed, 
and  is  still  living  and  at  work  in  the  world.  The 
Evolution  of  the  real  historic  Conmiunity  is  what 
we  shall  consider  in  the  following  account. 

A  remark  about  the  terms  here  used.  The 
words  communism,  communal,  commune  we 
employ  as  correlatives  with  CommunUy,  the  real 
existent  one,  without  reference  to  any  so-called 
communistic  scheme,  which  has  already  been 
treated  under  the  head  of  Communistic  Social- 
ism. Civic  Communism  is  through  the  Law  and 
Institution,  hence  is  consciously  institutional, 
whereas  Natural  Communism  is  rather  instinct- 
ively institutional,  arising,  as  w^e  often  sa}'-,  by 
Nature.  But  it  is  to  be  observed  that  both  are 
institutional,  the  one  being  civic  or  civilized,  the 
other  being  the  undeveloped  form  of  the  Com- 
munity. 

Modern  investigation  has  busied  itself  a  o-ood 
deal  with  the  early  forms  of  Society,  and  has 
unfolded  their  character  and  purpose  with  much 
success,  though  not  a  little  remains  to  be  done. 
Particularly  the  so-called  Village  Communities 
have  attracted  attention.  They  have  been  found 
in   their    primordial    activity   throughout  many 


292  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

countries,  and  numerous  modern  usages,  espe- 
cially in  regard  to  the  tenure  of  land,  have  been 
traced  back  to  these  primitive  social  arrange- 
ments. 

Such  studies  into  the  origin  of  Society  spring 
from  a  deep  spiritual  need  of  our  time.  The 
extreme  ends  of  the  o^reat  Arvan  mio-ration  last- 
ing  thousands  of  years,  Ireland  and  India,  are 
found  to  be  united  not  only  in  a  common  ances- 
tral speech,  but  in  common  early  Institutions  and 
Laws.  It  seems  to  be  the  function  of  England, 
which  belongs  to  the  same  Aryan  stock,  to  bring 
together  these  two  extremities,  not  only  by  exter- 
nal rule,  but  by  fostering  the  inner  bond  of  kin- 
ship. Says  Sir  Henry  Maine  (^Early  History  of 
Institutions, -g.  18):  "I,  myself,  believe  that 
the  government  of  India  by  the  English  has  been 
rendered  appreciably  easier  by  the  discoveries 
which  have  brought  home  to  the  educated  of  both 
races  the  common  Aryan  parentage  of  English- 
man and  Hindoo." 

Let  us  now  seek  to  bring  out  more  decidedly 
the  preceding  process  by  an  ordering  of  the  sig- 
nificant facts  which  belong  to  its  various  stages. 

I.  Natural  Communism.  There  are  instances 
of  the  Communism  of  Nature  in  the  lower  ani- 
mals and  even  in  the  insects.  The  bee  toils  for 
the  hive  and  not  for  itself  directly ;  it  does  not 
immediately  consume  the  sweets  which  it  gathers 
by  its  industry,  but  carries  them  to  the  common 


SOCIETY.  293 

store.  Its  instinct  is  communal  rather  than  in- 
dividualistic, whereof  other  instances  can  be 
shown  throughout  Nature. 

Passing  at  once  to  man,  we  find  that  in  his 
early  condition  he  also  shows  a  communal  in- 
stinct, as  it  were ;  he  toils  for  some  kind  of 
society,  and  thus  begins  to  show  himself  institu- 
tional. He  has  desire,  but  that  desire  is,  in  its 
chief  manifestations,  to  be  gratified  not  individ- 
ually but  through  the  community.  He  has  no 
ownership  at  first  in  what  he  produces ;  Property 
does  not  belong  to  him  at  the  start,  though  he 
begins  slowly  to  get  something  which  he  calls 
his  own. 

Thus  we  behold  Communism  as  the  social 
starting-point  of  man.  We  call  it  natural  as 
seems  given  by  Nature  herself;  the  individual 
acts  in  this  matter  instinctively,  not  consciously, 
or  not  in  any  large  degree  is  he  conscious ;  he  is 
carrying  out  the  promptings  of  his  Nature.  The 
members  of  such  a  community  are  primarily 
connected  by  blood,  a  natural  tie;  they  belong 
nowhere  else,  and  if  they  quit  it,  they  are  out- 
casts. They  cannot  change  societies  or  even 
localities  without  losinor  their  fundamental  insti- 
tutional  relation,  they  are  rooted  to  the  spot,  to 
the  soil,  they  are  in  the  vegetative  period  of 
Society. 

Accordingly  in  Natural  Communism  the  Insti- 
tution not  only  owns  the  Proporty  but  owns  the 


294  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

man,  he  is  absorbed  in  his  Community.  He  is 
not  free,  nor  does  the  Institution  will  his  free- 
dom, except  in  a  very  primitive  degree.  The 
result  is,  a  process  sets  in  toward  the  great  end 
of  humanity,  whose  destiny  is  to  become  free. 
Natural  Communism  will  pass  through  three 
main  stashes  in  which  it  is  seen  o-ettins:  rid  of 
itself  and  movino;  into  a  hio;her  social  form. 

1.  T7ie  Family  Community.  Or,  we  might 
say,  the  Family  regarded  as  a  Community,  looked 
at  specially  on  its  social  side,  not  on  its  domes- 
tic, though  the  two  sides  are  not  wholly  sepa- 
rable. The  Family  is  the  primordial  unit,  the 
institutional  cell  from  which  other  Institutions 
spring ;  they  all  seem  to  be  implicit  in  the  Family 
orioinally. 

The  members  of  the  Family  Commuuity  are, 
first  of  all,  closely  united  by  blood,  being  the 
descendants  of  a  known  ancestor,  often  alive  and 
present.  In  its  simplest  form  we  may  conceive 
of  it  as  composed  of  grandparents,  their  children 
and  their  grandchildren.  It  has  a  common  dwell- 
ing, common  table ;  the  work  of  each  individual 
is  for  the  whole  and  he  obtains  his  necessaries 
of  life  throuo^h  the  whole.  Both  land  and  mov- 
ables  are  held  in  common,  the  Property  belongs 
to  the  Family  Commuuity. 

Still  even  here  there  comes  to  be  a  slight  indi- 
vidual ownership.  Each  person  must  have  some 
thino-s  as  his  own.  oarments  are  not  whollv  held 


SOCIETY.  295 

in  common.  There  is  a  small  sphere  for  pres- 
ents which  arc  in  their  very  nature  personal. 

Such  a  Family  Community  is  seen  everywhere 
to-day.  But  in  modern  Society  it  begins  to  dis- 
solve when  the  children  are  of  asie  or  can  take 
care  of  themselves ;  with  the  death  of  the  parents 
the  Family  splits  up  into  its  individual  units,  and 
the  property  is  divided. 

But  in  early  Society  this  process  does  not  take 
place.  The  grandfathers  pass  away,  still  the 
blood-tie  remains,  and  the  descendants  hold  to- 
gether. There  is  the  common  hearth,  the  com- 
mon worship,  the  common  ancestor,  though  the 
families  increase.  Thus  a  group  of  families  ad- 
here together  round  a  common  center,  quite 
unable  to  sever  the  original  domestic  bond  and  to 
declare  their  independence. 

Still  there  grows  up  a  difference  from  the  sim- 
ple Family  Community,  which  gives  to  this  new 
Community  a  character  of  its  own.  The  group 
of  families,  though  held  together  by  the  domestic 
bond,  must  begin  to  show  its  own  distinct  org-ani- 
zation,  and  so  we  come  to  the  followinof  social 
form. 

2.  The  House  Community.  This  form  or 
stage  of  social  development  is  found  among  all 
peoples;  in  general,  the  various  branches  of  the 
Aryan  race  have  passed  and  are  still  passing 
through  it  from  India  to  Europe.  Particularly 
the    Slavonic    House    Communit}''   has  attracted 


296  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

attention  in  recent  years  and  has  often  been 
described.  There  is,  first  of  all,  the  idea  of  kin- 
ship, the  natural  tie  of  blood;  all  the  members 
are  supposed  to  be  derived  from  a  common  an- 
cestor. They  have  the  one  house  or  group  of 
houses  in  the  same  inclosure,  which  is  fenced 
off,  or  palisaded,  or  surrounded  with  trees. 
They  labor  in  common  and  enjoy  the  produce  of 
the  soil  in  common.  They  have  the  common 
meal  in  the  large  room  of  the  house.  The  sep- 
arate couples  have  their  own  apartments,  or 
often  they  house  themselves  in  small  independ- 
ent buildings  within  the  general  inclosure.  Of 
course  there  is  no  community  of  wives ;  it  is  a 
social  community,  common  effort,  common  prop- 
erty, common  enjoyment  of  this  effort  and  its 
property. 

One  of  the  distinctive  things  in  the  House 
Community  is  the  rise  of  the  political  element, 
showing  a  certain  Democratic  tendency.  Every 
man  has  a  voice  in  the  conduct  of  affairs.  The 
little  assembly  meets  every  day  and  deliberates, 
generally  in  the  evening  when  the  day's  work  is 
done,  seated  under  a  tree  in  the  inclosure.  The 
House  Communit}^  varies  much  in  size ;  it  may 
rise  to  sixty  or  seventy  persons,  or  drop  down  to 
ten  or  a  dozen.  Here  lies  a  chief  distinction 
between  the  simple  Family  Community,  which 
was  despotic,  ruled  by  the  living  father,  as  patri- 
arch, and  the   House  Communitv,  which  has  no 


SOCIETY.  297 

such  living  patriarch  but  has  the  need  and  tend- 
ency to  rule  itself. 

Still  there  must  be  a  chief  or  head  of  this 
primitive  government,  who,  however,  is  elected 
bj  the  members.  He  does  the  business  of  the 
Community  and  stands  for  it  to  the  outside  world. 
The  women  also  have  their  head  or  house-mother 
with  her  sphere  of  control  over  the  females  of 
the  community. 

Such  is  the  primitive  form  of  the  House 
Community  in  which  we  may  see  the  germ  of  im- 
portant poHtical  institutions  which  civilization  has 
developed.  Here  is  a  legislative  power,  here  is 
also  the  executive  power,  distinct,  yet  correlated. 
Here,  too,  is  that  social  feeling  which  works  for 
all,  for  the  community,  and  not  for  the  Self  by 
itself.  It  is  the  primitive  training  of  man  as  a 
social  being,  it  disciplines  him  out  of  immediate 
gratification,  out  of  selfish  anti-social  desire. 

Of  course  there  are  many  kinds  and  many 
stages  of  these  House  Communities.  Sir  Henry 
Maine  has  identified  them  with  the  Hindoo  Joint 
Family,  which  has  existed  down  to  the  present, 
through  all  sorts  of  conquests  and  revolutions 
that  have  swept  over  India  for  thousands  of  years. 
M.  de  Lavelcye  (in  his  work  on  Primitive  Prop- 
erty) has  traced  it  in  nearly  every  country  on  the 
globe,  and  found  it  among  peoples  out  of  whose 
midst  it  wa3  supposed  to  have  vanished  long  ago. 

The  House  Community  may,  therefore,  be  said 


2'J8  social  institutions. 

to  represent  a  universal  stage  of  the  social  de- 
velopment of  the  race.  We  can  see  the  needful 
social  discipline  which  it  gives  to  selfish  human 
nature.  But  like  all  other  stages  of  society,  its 
function  is  to  develop  man  bej'ond  itself;  he,  the 
limit-transcending,  is  not  to  stay  forever  crystal- 
lized in  the  routine  of  such  a  primitive  social 
organization.  It  trains  him  to  an  institutional 
life,  but  does  not  unfold  him  into  freedom  and 
universality.  It  gets  to  be  narrowing,  confining, 
enslaving,  and  the  human  spirit  must  transcend 
it  and  move  forward  into  a  new  and  freer  institu- 
tional form. 

Sometimes  the  House  Community  dissolves 
into  its  family  units ;  this  is  a  case  of  reversion 
to  a  previous  stage  (the  Family  Community)  and 
has  been  noticed  to  take  place  frequently  in 
India.  But  the  true  evolution  of  the  House 
Community  is  into  the  Village  Community,  which 
has  in  recent  times  attracted  the  attention  of  ob- 
servers more  than  even  the  House  Community. 

3.  The  Village  Community.  The  blood-tie 
which  was  the  strong  natural  bond  in  both  the 
Family  and  the  House  Communities,  now  recedes 
into  the  background,  even  if  it  does  not  wholly 
disappear.  Not  the  Community  based  on  birth 
but  on  land  becomes  the  central  fact  in  the  vil- 
laofe,  which  is  the  new  social  unit  before  us. 
Strangers  in  blood  can  now  be  members  of  the 
Communitv,  though  their  admission  be  difficult. 


SOCIETY.  299 

The  domestic  element  of  kinship  is  thus  quite 
eliminated,  and  the  social  element  of  property, 
specially  property  in  land,  is  the  pivotal  fact. 

Still  the  Village  Community  is  made  up  of 
Families  not  now  joined  together  in  the  House 
Community,  but  rather  the  Family  Community 
is  the  constituent.  Thus  we  see  a  return  to  the 
first  stage  but  not  a  relapse,  inasmuch  as  the 
Family  Community  has  become  an  element  of  a 
new  and  higher  institutional  form,  though  in  its 
own  sphere  it  is  independent  and  governed  ab- 
solutely by  its  head.  The  Village  Community  is 
the  third  and  last  stage  of  Natural  Communism, 
since  Nature,  the  soil,  furnishes  the  communal 
bond  uniting  its  members. 

Scattered  up  and  down  the  earth  are  many 
varieties  of  the  Village  Community,  in  many 
stages  of  development  and  decay ;  they  have  been 
traced  among  the  Aryan,  Semitic,  and  Turanian 
races,  but  amid  all  differences  the  essential  out- 
lines are  the  same.  The  Village  Community  is 
dealing  everywhere  with  the  land  question ;  man 
has  passed,  or  at  least  is  passing,  completely  out 
of  his  pastoral  life  into  his  fixed  abode  as  a  cul- 
tivator of  the  soil.  Shall  he  own  it  or  shall  it 
own  him,  or  determine  his  existence?  Certainly 
it  settles  him,  fastening  him  to  one  spot  and  into 
one  social  form.  Thus  the  Village  Community 
will  show  an  inner  struggle,  which  is  at  bottom 
that  same  old  struggle  for  freedom. 


300  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

In  regard  to  property  a  distinction  has  arisen — 
the  movables  belong  to  the  individual  or  to  the 
separate  families  now,  not  to  the  Community.  In 
this  way  a  considerable  sphere  of  private  owner- 
ship has  shown  itself,  indicative  of  the  tendency 
of  things.  The  members  are  getting  used  to 
having  their  own  possessions ;  property  individ- 
ualized is  becoming  an  important  fact,  a  grow- 
ing consciousness. 

The  land  belonging  to  the  Village  Community 
is  usually  divided  into  three  portions :  the  arable 
part,  the  pasture,  and  the  waste  or  forest.  The 
Swiss  villagers,  speaking  of  their  land  (AII- 
mend)  say :  FeJd,  Weide,  Wald.  The  arable 
part  is  still  further  divided  into  lots,  of  which 
each  family  obtains  one  for  cultivation.  The 
pasture  is  also  divided  into  lots  and  assigned  to 
the  members  of  the  Community,  but  the  waste  or 
unused  portion  is  held  in  common. 

Sometimes  there  is  no  partitipn  of  the  soil, 
but  it  is  cultivated  in  common,  and  the  produce 
divided.  Then  again  there  is  a  permanent  appor- 
tionment of  certain  parts,  while  other  parts  are 
held  in  common.  More  often  the  lots  are  kept 
by  the  same  person  for  a  term  of  years  when 
there  is  a  new  distribution.  Such  a  Community 
has  a  good  deal  of  business  to  transact  and  in- 
ternal matters  to  settle,  such  as  the  time  and 
manner  of  partition,  the  periods  of  sowing  and 
harvesting,  etc.     This  is  done  by  the  assembly 


SOCIETT.  801 

of  which  all  the  men  are  members.  Yet  here 
too  one  may  find  every  gradation  between  democ- 
racy and  aristocracy. 

Perhaps  the  most  interesting  of  all  the  forms  of 
the  Village  Community  is  that  known  in  Russia, 
called  the  mir.  It  is  a  surprising  fact  that  this 
system  of  communism  prevails  throughout  the 
largest  country  of  Europe  among  its  agricul- 
tural population.  And  it  is  Natural  Communism, 
a  growth  of  Nature,  as  it  were,  a  sponta- 
neous product  of  the  social  man.  This  mir  is 
the  institutional  unit  of  the  vast  Russian  Em- 
pire. It  alone  is  the  proprietor  of  the  soil 
of  which  the  individual  member  has  only  the  use, 
but  docs  not  possess.  It  is  responsible  to  the 
lord  for  rent,  to  the  government  for  taxes,  and 
for  so  many  soldiers;  otherwise  it  is  a  self-gov- 
erning, independent  unit,  endowed  with  an  enor- 
mous vitality,  truly  the  Russian  monad  or 
indestructible  atom.  Other  Village  Communities 
have  dissolved,  and  are  now  dissolving,  but  the 
Russian  mir,  recognized  and  confirmed  by  the 
government  in  its  autonomy,  seems  more  stable 
than  ever.  It  has  resisted  all  attempts  to  make 
land  ownership  individual,  and  thus  stands  in 
marked  contrast  to  Western  Europe,  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  has  resisted  Nihilism,  being  the 
bulwark  of  the  Russian  Empire. 

It  has  been  much  discussed  whether  the  mir  is 
an  advantage  or  a  drawback  to  Russia.     The  Rus- 


302  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

sians  themselves  are  much  divided  on  the  ques- 
tion (see  M.  de  Laveleye's  work  on  Primitive 
Property,  Chap.  II.  and  III.).  It  doubtless  re- 
tards agriculture,  but  it  prevents  pauperism,  and 
maintains  social  equality.  It  has  met  with  great 
favor  in  the  school  of  social  democrats,  such  as 
Herzen  and  Bakunin .  On  the  other  hand  the  upper 
classes  of  Russia  are  said  to  be  hostile  to  the 
mir,  deeming  it  to  be  that  element  of  the  social 
order  which  keeps  Russia  in  a  backward  con- 
dition. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  there  is  one  little 
corner  of  Western  Europe  in  which  the  Village 
Community  has  maintained  itself  down  to  the 
present  time.  In  the  Forest  Cantons  of  Switzer- 
land there  is  still  the  social  unit  which  retains 
almost  unimpaired  communal  autonomy  and  com- 
munal property.  The  one  confers  upon  the  hardy 
mountaineers  their  political  freedom,  the  other 
their  social  equality.  But  here,  too,  the 
principle  of  the  Village  Community  is  being 
stoutly  assailed,  and  will  probably  vanish  with 
time. 

In  Germam^  France,  England,  Ireland  the 
former  existence  of  the  Village  Community  has 
been  brought  to  light  by  investigators.  This 
institutional  form  may  be  said  to  be  a  universal 
stage  through  which  quite  every  society  has  to 
pass  in  its  development.  In  China,  Java,  India, 
America  it  has   been  pointed   out  as  well  as  in 


SOCIETY.  808 

Europe ;  the  counlTies  of  classical  antiquity  man- 
ifest the  same  social  phenomenon. 

Still  the  Village  Community  shows  itself  to  be 
a  transitional  stage  in  the  Evolution  of  Society. 
Individual  ownership  rises  against  it  and  in  the 
most  advanced  nations  of  the  world  puts  it  down. 
At  a  certain  period  of  its  growth  it  begins  to  clog 
the  full,  free  development  of  the  individual  in 
his  march  toward  institutional  freedom.  It  binds 
him  to  the  soil,  it  makes  a  physical  object 
his  controller,  his  determinant.  In  the  Vil- 
lage Community  man  has  not  yet  quite 
severed  the  umbilical  cord  which  ties  him 
to  Mother  Nature.  The  operation  may  be 
painful,  but  it  has  to  be  done  if  the  human 
being  is  ever  to  be  a  free,  self-active,  self- 
determined  personality. 

Such  is  the  sphere  of  Natural  Communism  with 
its  three  prominent  stages,  which  are  not  simply 
successive  in  time,  but  are  usually  in  a  process 
with  one  another,  and  of  this  process  there  are 
many  gradations.  For  instance,  the  South  Slavo- 
nians (in  Turkey  and  Austria)  are  said  by  Sir 
Henry  Maine  {Early  Law  and  Custom,  Chap. 
VIII.)  to  have  developed  specially  the  House 
Community,  but  not  the  Village  Community  to 
any  extent,  while  the  North  Slavonians  (Russia) 
have  developed  the  Village  Communitj^  but  not 
the  House  Community.  In  Hindostan,  however, 
and  in  other  countries,  both  the  House  and  the 


804  aOOIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Village  Communities  are  present  together  in  the 
same  province  or  nation. 

In  social  embryology,  it  is  often  a  disputed 
question  just  what  form  is  the  starting-point. 
If  the  Village  Community  is  taken  as  the  social 
cell,  as  many  do,  then  the  Family  Community 
must  be  regarded  as  the  nucleus  of  the  cell.  The 
social  unit  will  have  its  organization  and  process, 
and  perhaps  it  is  better  to  consider  the  entire 
movement  of  what  we  have  termed  Natural  Com- 
munism as  the  originative  principle  of  society 
when  man  has  settled  down  to  till  the  earth  and 
to  become  institutional. 

The  three  stashes  in  the  movement  of  Natural 
Communism,  we  may  here  briefly  recapitulate. 
The  Family  Community  has  everything  in  com- 
mon along  with  absolute  authority  in  the  father 
or  patriarch.  The  House  Community  has  all 
property  in  common  and  is  composed  of  joint 
Families,  though  with  a  certain  separative  ten- 
dency, while  self-government  begins  to  show  itself 
in  the  assembly  for  deliberation.  The  Village 
Community  does  not  insist  on  the  blood-tie,  and 
has  the  tendency  to  give  up  the  movables  to 
separate  ovi^nership,  while  the  land  remains  col- 
lective property.  Moreover  the  political  organi- 
zation of  the  Village  Community  develops  quite 
fully,  showing dehberative,  executive,  and  judicial 
functions,  usually  with  leanings  toward  democratic 
forms  of  procedure. 


so  C IE  TV.  305 

The  next  great  fact  we  observe  is  the  gradual 
breaking-up  and  submergence  of  the  Village 
Community  among  peoples  of  advancing  civiliza- 
tion. Its  foundation  stone,  the  common  property 
in  land,  is  undermined,  and  a  new  social  order 
takes  its  place.  This  is  what  we  shall  next  con- 
sider. 

II.  Individual  Ownership.  This  is  now  to 
become  general  and  is  specially  to  be  applied  to 
land,  which  is  the  last  to  yield  itself  up  to  be  the 
Person's  own  (ownership).  The  soil  being  im- 
movable is  the  least  tractable  to  man's  complete 
possession.  The  earth  for  a  long  time  asserts 
that  it  owns  the  man,  but  man  has  finally  to 
assert  that  he  owns  the  earth.  In  the  movement 
toward  freedom  Property  has  to  be  individual- 
ized, the  personal  Will  must  make  itself  real  in 
the  land  as  well  as  in  the  thing.  The  cosmos 
itself  has  to  go  through  the  crucible  of  the  indi- 
vidual Ego,  ere  the  latter  can  know  itself  as  free. 
Already  such  a  tendency  was  manifest  in  the 
movement  of  Natural  Communism,  as  just  shown. 
It  may  be  declared  that  the  destiny  of  all  exter- 
nality is  that  it  be  made  internal,  be  made  some- 
body's own.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  just  as 
necessary  that  the  internal  element,  the  Ego,  bo 
externalized,  be  made  a  reality  which  it  is  in 
Propert}^  though  we  would  all  say  that  Property 
is  not  the  highest  realization  of  human  spirit. 

Many  have  praised  the  Village  Community  as 

20 


306  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  truly  free  Society,  and  have  sought  to  return 
to  it  as  to  the  primitive  paradise  of  liberty.  But 
we  have  already  seen  it  is  not  free  except  in  a 
very  limited  backward  sense.  It  is  exclusive, 
and  can  becojne  very  despotic  (the  reproach 
often  cast  upon  the  Kussian  mir),  and  is  not 
universally  human,  which  is  the  requirement  of 
freedom  in  these  days  ;  it  is  an  institutional  form 
which  does  not  will  Free-Will  absolutely,  but 
conditionally,  within  its  own  confines  and  not 
always  there. 

Individual  Ownership  is  the  stage  of  separation 
from  the  immediate  communal  life,  and  the  divi- 
sion of  the  common  property  belonging  to  the 
commune.  The  land  is  now  assigned  to  the  in- 
dividual  as  his  own,  instead  of  his  beino-  assio^ned 
to  the  land  by  the  communHy.  The  "  shifting 
severalties,"  so  well  known  in  English  law,  and 
characteristic  of  the  early  Village  Community, 
have  ceased,  which  means  that  the  center  has 
moved  from  the  land  to  the  individual,  who  is  no 
longer  shifted  about  from  one  piece  of  ground  to 
another,  but  is  himself  the  determining  principle 
of  the  soil.  "We  may  make  a  comparison  between 
this  change  and  the  change  from  the  Ptolemaic 
to  the  Copernican  theory,  in  which  the  human 
mind  passed  from  regarding  the  earth  as  the  cen- 
ter of  the  Solar  Svstem  and  took  the  sun  as  that 
center.  In  like  manner  we  may  deem  Natural 
Communism  to  be  geocentric,  till  individual  own- 


t^OCIETY.  307 

cislii})  breaks  it  up  and  places  the  deteniiiuing 
point  in  the  human  Ego,  which  thu?  becomes 
analogically  heliocentric. 

Still  Individual  Ownership  is  not  the  finality ; 
it  will  show  limitation,  and  will  develop  an  excess 
which  will  call  forth  a  new  institutional  form  for 
the  purpose  of  curbing  its  destructive  tendencies. 
Individualism  with  its  unbridled  self-appropria- 
tion evokes  mightier  negative  forces  in  Society 
than  simple  Natural  Communism,  which  after  all 
is  a  rather  innocent  paradisaical  thing,  suitable  to 
the  needs  of  a  primitive  agricultural  community. 

The  transition  to  Individual  Ownership  of  the 
soil  out  of  earlier  social  forms  has  been  an  ex- 
ceedingly long  and  slow  one,  with  many  varia- 
tions in  different  parts  of  the  globe.  Here  we 
can  only  notice  three  stages  in  the  historical 
movement  of  Europe,  which  show  a  connected 
development  in  this  field  from  antiquity  down  to 
the  present. 

1.  Classical  Antiquitij.  In  both  Greece  and 
Home  there  are  many  evidences  of  a  period  of 
Natural  Communism  antecedent  to  the  historical 
period  of  Individual  Ownership,  as  it  is  known  to 
us  in  ancient  literature.  In  fact,  Natural  Com- 
munism leaves  little  or  no  written  record  of  itself ; 
its  documents  are  chiefly  tradition,  it  is  incon- 
sistent with  letters  and  with  education,  which  de- 
velop the  individual.  Already  in  Homer  we  see 
that  land  is  not  common;   the  village  of  Ithaca 


308  SOCIAL  IX.STITUTIONS. 

has  nothing  to  do  whh  the  estate  of  Ulysses^ 
which  is  despoiled  by  the  suitors ;  it  is  wholly  his 
private  property.  Far  otherwise  would  the  situ- 
ation have  been  if  Ithaca  had  been  a  Village  Com- 
munity with  soil  undivided. 

Still  Greek  legend  has  not  let  the  earlier 
period  die,  but  has  transmitted  fair  pictures  of 
the  Golden  Age,  Avhen  lands  were  common  and 
undivided,  when  the  earth  brought  forth  her 
fruits  for  all  equally.  This  was  during  the  an- 
cient rule  of  Saturn,  before  the  advent  of  Jupiter 
and  the  new  Gods  with  their  new  order.  So  all 
classic  literature  from  Hesiod  down  looked  back 
upon  a  past  blissful  epoch  when  there  was  neither 
wealth  nor  poverty,  because  there  Avas  no  such 
thing  as  ownership.  Particularly  Virgil  and  the 
later  Roman  poets  sang  of  that  antique  time  with 
a  melancholy  longing,  and  hoped  for  and  could 
even  prophesy  its  return,  oppressed  as  they  were 
with  the  bitter  conflict  between  the  rich  and  the 
poor,  which  was  the  destructive  canker  of  their 
age. 

Another  striking;  fact  lookino;  in  the  same  direc- 
tion  is  found  in  Plato,  who  sought  to  reconstruct 
the  institutions  of  his  time,  especially  in  his 
Hepublic  and  in  his  Laivs.  In  both  these  Avorks 
are  many  social  arrangements  which  strikingly 
recall  Natural  Communism,  and  leave  little  doubt 
that  Plato  drew  upon  the  reality  for  his  sugges- 
tions in  numerous    instances.     That    reality  was 


SOCIETY.  30y 

both  past  and  present;  he  had  only  to  look  at 
the  rustic  outlying  backward  communities  of 
Hellas  in  his  own  time  to  see  what  had  been  the 
past  of  Athens.  The  Republic  of  Plato  is 
usually  supposed  to  be  an  ideal  product  of  his 
iraao-iiiation,  but  it  is  a  looking;  backward  more 
than  a  looking  forward,  a  return  to  the  old  more 
than  a  construction  of  the  new. 

Moreover,  history  has  a  word  to  say  in  this 
matter,  though  not  as  certain  as  it  might  be. 
There  is  a  o-eneral  statement  amons;  Greek  writers 
that  Theseus,  the  supreme  Athenian  hero,  unified 
Attica.  What  does  this  mean?  Before  his  time 
the  country  was  split  up  into  a  number  of  inde- 
pendent families  and  clans;  he  brought  them 
under  one  government  and  founded  the  greatness 
of  Athens.  There  can  be  little  doubt  that  this 
signifies  the  transition  out  of  the  House  Com- 
munity and  the  Village  Community  into  the  City 
proper,  which  becomes  the  center  of  ancient  civ- 
ilization. In  like  manner  Rome  was  formed  by 
the  coalescence  of  several  Village  Communities, 
which  was  the  work  of  its  heroic  founder. 

Thus  the  ancient  City  is  an  evolution  out  of  the 
Village  Community,  Avhich  thereby  loses  its  essen- 
tial characteristic,  common  property  in  land. 
But  a  new  conflict  takes  its  place  —  the  struggle 
of  the  rightlcss  for  rights,  of  the  Plebs  versus 
the  Patricians,  of  the  Demus  versus  the  Eupatrids. 
The  result  is  the  triuin[)h  of  the  popuhirside; 


olO  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

not  only  is  individual  property  acknowledged,  but 
individual  right  also ;  universal  citizenship  was 
proclaimed  at  Rome  about  the  time  of  the  em- 
peror Caracalla. 

2.  Feudalism.  In  the  vast  Roman  Empire 
individual  ownership  of  land  had  worked  itself 
out  to  its  extreme  negative  conclusion.  A  few 
proprietors  owned  substantially  the  soil  of  Italy 
which  was  cultivated  by  slaves  mainly.  The  in- 
dependent cultivator  of  the  land,  who  owned 
himself  and  the  ground  he  tilled,  had  quite  dis- 
appeared, and  with  him  the  Roman  conqueror  of 
the  World.  The  body  of  the  people,  through 
the  operation  of  individual  ownership  in  land, 
had  lost  all  ownership  in  land. 

Such  was  the  general  situation  when  a  new 
order  began  to  appear.  The  Northern  Barba- 
rians, mostly  of  Teutonic  descent,  came  down 
upon  the  Roman  Empire  and  conquered  it,  for  it 
was  already  conquered  internally.  Where  were 
its  defenders?  Certainly  the  masses  could  not 
be  interested  in  the  maintenance  of  such  a  social 
system. 

Now  these  Northern  Peoples  brought  with  them 
into  the  conquered  lands,  their  own  supreme 
social  institution  which  was  the  Teutonic  Mark, 
or  the  Village  Community.  These  Teutons  were 
Aryans,  and  they  had  this  old  Aryan  institution, 
which  still  maintained  a  certain  form  of  common 
ownership  of  land,  and   which  we  have  already 


SOCIETY.  311 

seen  to  be  the  early  social  principle  of  both 
Greece  and  Rome.  Thus  civilized  antiquity, 
after  the  development  of  a  thousand  years,  is 
whirled  back  to  its  beginning  and  compelled  to 
take  a  fresh  dip  into  the  fountain-head  of  its  own 
institutional  origin.  The  Teutonic  conquerors 
were  quite  in  the  condition  of  Attica  in  the  time 
of  Theseus  and  of  Rome  in  the  time  of  Romulus. 
So  we  may  say  that  the  Village  Community  after 
being  conquered  and  suppressed  by  Individual 
Ownership  in  land,  rises  and  conquers  in  turn. 

The  result,  however,  will  be  not  destruction, 
but  a  coalescence  and  intersjrowth  of  the  two 
principles  which  will  give  rise  to  what  is  known 
as  Feudalism.  Again  land  will  determine  the 
man,  his  social  and  political  status,  and  yet  it 
will  not  be  held  in  common.  The  Feudal  Sys- 
tem will  have  both  Roman  and  Teutonic  ele- 
ments, it  will  be  a  commiuglino;  of  individualistic 
and  communistic  principles.  The  ownership  of 
land  will  vest  in  an  individual,  not  in  a  commun- 
ity ;  yet  the  owner,  just  through  his  tenure  of 
the  land,  is  bound  to  certain  services  and  takes  a 
certain  social  position.  These  services,  again, 
belong  not  to  the  community  but  to  an  indi- 
vidual, to  the  lord  paramount.  Thus  the  com- 
mon land  of  the  Village  Community  was 
subjected  to  individual  ownership,  and  indi- 
vidual ownership  of  land  in  turn  was  sub- 
jected  to    a    superior  or    a  series    of    superiors 


312  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

culminating  in  the  king,  who  was  liimself 
subjected  to  the  System.  The  result  was  that 
society  was  composed  of  a  succession  of  layers, 
one  over  the  other  from  bottom  to  top,  the  prin- 
ciple of  stratification  being  the  tenure  of  land, 
which  became  of  many  kinds. 

The  conquest  of  the  Eoman  Empire  by  the 
Germanic  tribes  was  not  a  mere  predatory  incur- 
sion of  a  barbarous  horde,  but  it  was  a  great 
migration  of  peoples  who  took  with  them  their 
wives  and  little  ones,  their  herds,  household 
goods  and  gods,  as  well  as  their  weapons;  espe- 
cially did  they  carry  along,  for  they  could  not 
help  it,  their  social  and  political  organization, 
which  they  superposed  upon  the  old  civilization 
of  the  conquered  territory.  That  civilization  had 
held  sway  for  a  thousand  years,  speaking  in  round 
numbers.  This  new  system  of  Feudalism  is  to 
develop  and  rule  in  Europe  for  another  thousand 
years,  speaking  in  round  numbers  (very  round  in 
this  case). 

The  characteristic  of  Feudalism  is  the  social 
and  political  separation  of  men  and  their  division 
into  classes  whose  rank  is  determined  by  some- 
thing external,  b}^  the  way  they  hold  their  land. 
Yet  it  is  undeniable  that  the  Feudal  System  was 
a  necessity  of  the  time,  it  did  its  part  toward 
saving  ancient  civilization,  which  it  rejuvenated 
socially  by  engrafting  upon  it  the  Village  Com- 
munity, an  Institution  belonging  to  the  youth  of 


SOCIETY.  313 

society.  It  is  tlie  custom  in  some  quarters  to 
abuse  Feudalism,  and  it  is  superannuated  for  the 
advanced  nations  of  the  world ;  still  it  should  be 
appreciated  in  the  great  historic  succession  of 
social  Institutions. 

We  must,  however,  see  that  the  Feudal  System 
at  last  becomes  hostile  to  freedom  and  progress. 
The  rise  of  the  Free  Cities  was  an  important 
step  beyond  Feudalism,  and  it  cannot  endure  the 
modern  industrial  spirit.  But  its  most  terrible 
trial,  the  most  furiouslj^  vindictive  blow  that  it 
or  any  Institution  ever  received  may  be  noticed. 

3.  Tlte  French  Revolution,  Innumerable  causes 
have  been  assigned  for  the  French  Revolution, 
but  Feudalism  is  seldom  omitted  from  their  num- 
ber, though  given  different  degrees  of  importance. 
The  peasantry  which  cultivated  the  soil  of  France 
sought  to  get  rid  of  the  feudal  dues  which  they 
were  compelled  to  pay  to  the  nobility  through  the 
tenure  of  land.  This  tenure  was  mainly  what  is 
known  in  English  Law  as  Copyhold,  hence  a  dis- 
tinguished English  lawyer  declares  that  "the 
French  Revolution  took  place  because  a  great 
part  of  the  soil  of  France  was  held  on  a  Copyhold 
Tenure." 

Already  we  have  noticed  that  the  Feudal  Sys- 
tem sprang  from  the  Teutonic  Mark  or  Village 
Community  beingtransformed  through  Individual 
Ownership  into  the  medieval  Manor  or  Fief  with 
its  personal  service  on  the  one  side,  and  its  indi- 


314  80UIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

vidual  tenure  of  the  land  on  the  other.  It  is 
well  known  that  the  Roman  Law  greatly  assisted 
the  barbarous  conquerors  of  the  Roman  Empire 
to  bring;  about  this  transformation,  throuoh  its 
insistence  upon  the  right  of  private  property. 
The  stress  given  to  Individual  Ownership  is  felt 
in  those  two  words  of  the  Roman  Law,  suiim 
cidque,  w^hich  have  been  sometimes  declared  to 
contain  its  essence.  Now  it  is  this  personal  ser- 
vice in  the  form  of  feudal  dues  connected  with  the 
cultivation  of  the  soil  which  the  French  Revolu- 
tion smote  with  such  unparalleled  vengeance .  For 
it  was  not  sated  till  the  noblesse  who  held  these 
feudal  claims  were  not  only  deprived  of  them  but 
were  driven  from  France  or  done  to  death  by  the 
guillotine.  The  Revolution  was  not  a  Parisian 
aifair  merely,  as  it  seems  on  its  face;  its  flames 
were  fed  by  the  peasants  who  never  stopped  till 
they  made  their  land  free  of  its  feudal  burdens. 
Throughout  the  greater  part  of  rural  France  the 
skies  were  red  with  burning  castles  and  mansions 
of  nobles  to  which  the  peasantry  set  fire  in  order 
to  consume,  it  is  said  by  historians,  the  titles  and 
other  evidences  of  feudal  claims  upon  the  soil. 

The  same  change  took  place  in  other  countries, 
but  without  such  a  tremendous  explosion.  It 
took  place  in  England  quite  gradually  and  peace- 
fully. Sir  Henry  Maine  has  devoted  an  interest- 
ing Chapter  {Early  Law  and  Custom,  C.  IX.) 
to  showing  why  the  abolition  of  the  same  kind 


SOCIETY.  315 

of  land  tenure  (the  Copyhold)  produced  a  rev- 
olution in  France  and  no  disturbance  at  all  in 
England.  The  result,  however,  was  the  same  in 
both  countries,  the  practical  end  of  Feudalism. 

Thus  modern  civilization  has  returned  to  com- 
plete Individual  Ownership  in  land,  such  as  we 
noted  in  ancient  civilization.  Greece  and  Rome 
are  much  nearer  to  us  socially  than  our  own 
Teutonic  ancestors  with  their  Mark,  even  nearer 
to  us  than  the  Feudal  Ages  with  their  peculiar 
social  system.  The  Renascence  made  us  acquain- 
ted with  the  classic  world  in  its  literary,  artistic, 
and  also  political  aspects.  But  only  in  recent 
years  do  we  seem  to  know  Greece  and  Rome 
sociaUv ;  thus  modernity  and  antiquity  are  shaking- 
hands  across  the  centuries  with  a  fresh  and  deeper 
acquaintance. 

Still  the  other  element  has  not  been  inactive. 
France  in  particular  has  been  prolific  of  com- 
munistic schemes  since  the  Revolution,  which 
fact  indicates  a  strong  reaction  in  many  minds 
against  the  excessive  individualism  of  that  event . 
Thus  we  see  likewise  a  return  to  early  com- 
munism, modified  of  course  to  suit  modern  con- 
ditions. So  vital  and  perdurable  is  that  primor- 
dial social  cell  of  tlie  human  race,  the  Village 
Community :  we  behold  it  rising  and  reproducing 
itself,  ideally  if  not  really,  in  the  very  heart  of 
modern  civilization.  It  has  not  yet  come  as  ;i 
conqueror    as  it  did  to  the  Roman  Empire,  nor 


316  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Avill  it  probably;  but  it  has  doubtless  still  a  part 
to  play  in  social  development. 

III.  Civic  Communism.  Our  age  is  the  bloom 
of  Individual  Ownership  in  land  and  in  all  other 
things.  The  exploitation  of  the  personal  factor 
of  humanity  is  the  fact  and  probably  the  vocation 
of  our  era.  The  old  world  has  broken  or  is 
breaking  down  the  barriers  to  specialized  posses- 
sion of  the  soil  by  man,  and  the  new  world  has 
never  allowed  them  to  be  put  up.  The  result  is 
a  marvelous  conquest  of  whole  continents  through 
individual  energy,  primarily  seen  in  agriculture, 
then  in  the  means  of  transportation  and  inter- 
communication (railroad,  telegraph,  etc.),  then 
in  commercial  and  industrial  expansion. 

Moreover  all  political  discrimination  against 
the  individual  is  substantially  broken  down. 
Equality  before  law  is  the  universal  law  of  the 
new  civilization ;  equal  opportunity  for  every  man 
is  secured  as  far  as  the  State  can  secure  it,  and 
political  power  is  largely  put  into  the  hands  of 
the  people.  The  age  of  the  political  tyrant  seems 
to  be  quite  past ;  we  read  of  him.  in  ancient  and 
medieval  historj',  when  he  was  often  a  success, 
that  is,  a  natural  outgrowth  of  the  time,  and 
often  doubtless  a  blessing. 

Still,  along  with  this  political  equality  has  risen 
a  social  inequality — the  inequality  in  the  owner- 
ship of  property  —  which,  if  not  already,  soon 
will  be,  the  greatest  that  ever  existed  in  any  time 


SOCIETY.  317 

or  country.  The  individuiil,  turned  loose  into  :i 
free  world  and  permitted  to  the  fullest  extent  to 
realize  his  capacity  or  incapacity,  especially  in 
the  matter  of  acquiring  wealth,  will  show  every 
grade  of  inequality  from  the  slum-dweller  to  the 
billionaire.  Not  society  but  the  free-acting  Self 
is  what  creates  the  unequal  distribution  of  prop- 
erty, at  least  this  is  its  primary  source. 

The  present  fact,  which  is  fundamental,  we 
may  unfold  a  little.  First  of  all,  there  is  a  dif- 
ference in  talent,  which  is  sure  to  reflect  itself  in 
what  each  person  produces.  One  man  has  great 
power  of  combination  and  foresight,  another  has 
almost  none.  In  truth,  the  chief  cause  of  pov- 
erty is  improvidence,  a  personal,  not  a  social 
matter.  In  the  second  place  there  is  the 
diiference  in  education,  which  also  tells  greatly 
upon  the  value  of  effort.  Hence  the  School 
is  the  grand  social  equalizer,  created  and  main- 
tained by  Society,  to  level  as  far  as  possible  all 
inequality.  In  the  third  place  there  is  the  differ- 
ence in  aim  and  ambition,  when  talent  and  edu- 
cation may  be  quite  the  same,  and  this  too 
produces  inequality  of  wealth.  Of  two  men 
equally  gifted  by  nature,  and  equally  educated, 
one  may  have  the  ambition  to  be  a  money-getter, 
and  the  other  to  be  a  schoolmaster.  It  is  not 
the  fault  of  the  social  system  if,  after  twenty 
years'  time,  the  one  is  rich  and  the  other  poor. 
Each  has  gotten  his  own,  the  result  of  his  own 


318  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

choice,  the  fruits  of  his  own  Tocation.  The  one 
has  spent  his  days  upon  man-building,  the  other 
upon  fortune-building ;  each  has  attained  within 
limits  his  end,  and  that  is  his  reward.  -Any  in- 
terference with  this  result,  any  transfer  of  the 
reward  of  the  one  to  the  other  from  the  outside 
is  a  violation  of  personal  liberty. 

Thus  the  world  of  individuals  endowed  with 
equal  opportunity  and  political  equality,  is  bound 
to  bring  forth  the  most  complete  social  inequalit}^ 
just  through  individual  freedom.  Each  indi- 
vidual must  be  allowed  to  unfold  his  own  self- 
hood, expressing  it  in  the  acquisition  of  property 
as  in  other  things  ;  hence  the  inequality  in  wealth 
and  in  other  things,  such  as  knowledge  and 
wisdom. 

At  this  point  we  may  see  the  chief  mistake  of 
the  majority  of  social  reformers.  They  leave  out 
or  discredit  the  subjective  factor ;  they  seem  to 
think  that  every  man  is  made  after  the  one  pat- 
tern, that  all  are  the  same  in  natural  ability, 
education  and  ambition,  not  to  speak  of  other 
differences.  They  look  into  dark  corners  and 
behold  wretched  poverty ;  at  once  they  begin  an 
onslaught  upon  society  in  which  such  a  thing  can 
occur  and  never  think  to  inquire :  Is  or  is  not  this 
miserable  condition  the  result  of  man's  own  free 
act?  Shall  we  take  away  his  freedom  and  com- 
pel him  not  to  be  poor?  Political  liberty  and 
equality  lead  to  social  inequality,  for  they  bring 


SOCIETY.  319 

to  the  surface  jiiid  make  valid  all  the  diverse 
phases  of  individuality.  The  incapable  must 
show  their  incapacity  just  as  brilliantly  as  the 
capable  show  their  capacity ;  in  this  respect  free- 
dom is  far  more  remorseless  than  paternalism. 
When  we  find  an  institution  which  can  bring  us 
equality  of  talent  or  of  wisdom,  then  we  can  have 
equality  of  wealth  or  at  least  its  equivalent.  The 
difficulty,  then,  is  primarily  not  social,  but  psy- 
chical. The  reformer  is  inclined  to  flatter  pov- 
erty, making  it  believe  that  it  has  had  no  hand 
in  its  own  existence,  but  that  this  is  caused  by 
society  or  possibly  by  the  rich  man.  Our  time 
has  witnessed  the  flowering  of  what  may  be 
called  social  demagoguery,  the  counterpart  of 
political  demagoguery,  which  is  still  alive  but 
seems  not  so  flourishing  as  it  once  was. 

But  now  for  the  other  side.  There  is  no  doubt 
that  wealth  can  become  and  does  become  grasp- 
ing, tyrannical,  negative  to  the  very  social  order 
whence  it  sprang.  The  free  individual,  unfold- 
ing through  his  freedoui  and  amassing  vast  prop- 
erties can  and  does  use  them  not  infrequently  to 
the  detriment  of  the  freedom  of  others.  At  this 
point  Individual  Ownership  has  become  self-de- 
structive; the  free  individual,  in  the  untram- 
meled  pursuit  of  private  gain,  uses  the  liberty 
which  he  has  enjoyed  and  employed,  to  assail 
and  destroy  that  same  liberty  in  others.  That 
is,  Free-Will,  instead  of  securing  Free- Will,  has 


320  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

become  negative  to  Free-Will  and  thus  is  anti- 
institutional.  For,  as  we  may  recollect,  the  pos- 
itive Institution  is  actualized  Free-Will,  which 
returns  and  secures  itself. 

Thus  Individual  Ownership  must  be  followed 
or  transformed  and  corrected  by  another  insti- 
tutional form  which  we  have  here  called  Civic 
Communism.  We  observe  that  this  is  in  one 
way  a  return  to  Communism,  yet  not  to  Natural 
Communism.  The  Community  must  again  hold 
property,  especially  must  it  take  possession  of 
its  own  property,  determining  slowly,  carefully, 
justly  what  is  its  own  property.  For  the  free 
Individual  in  exploiting  his  freedom  of  acquisi- 
tion, has  also  appropriated  the  Community's 
wealth.  Still  Individual  Ownership  in  its  right- 
ful sphere  is  not  to  be  jeoparded,  but  is  to  be  the 
more  carefully  confirmed  and  secured  because  of 
this  limitation  put  upon  it  in  new  social  arrange- 
ments. But  where  it  has  become  destructive  of 
freedom,  and  indeed  self -destructive,  it  must  be 
saved  from  itself. 

The  use  of  the  word  Communism  in  the  pres- 
ent connection  is  to  be  attentively  observed.  It 
does  not  mean  Communism  of  wives  or  of  goods, 
to  which  it  is  often  applied ;  nor  does  it  mean 
Communism  of  land.  Its  root  lies  in  the  Civil 
Community,  in  the  town,  city.  State;  hence  we 
call  it  Civic  Communism,  signifying  that  the  said 
Civil  Community  holds  its  own  property  for  the 


SOCIETY.  321 

benefit  of  all  its  members.  Thus  there  is  com- 
munal property,  but  just  as  well  individual  prop- 
erty. 

One  of  the  leading  social  questions  of  the  time, 
if  not  absolutely  the  one  great  question,  pertains 
to  this  resumption  of  communal  ownership.  It 
is  deeply  fermenting  in  the  spirit  of  the  age,  and 
is  showing  itself  under  many  diverse  forms, 
chiefly  in  the  way  of  theory,  not,  however,  with- 
out taking  certain  practical  shapes.  Civic  Com- 
munism is  gradually  crystallizing  itself;  we  may 
here  designate  certain  general  phases  which  have 
already  manifested  themselves  in  its  process. 

1.  There  are  writers  of  power  and  influence 
who  advocate  a  return  to  the  Village  Community 
with  its  reservation  of  communal  land.  These 
writers  cannot  endure  the  thought  of  inequal- 
ity in  property  which  they  deem  the  Satanic 
destroyer  of  all  happiness  and  of  modern  civiliza- 
tion. Hence  they  advise  flight — rapid  flight 
back  to  that  primitive  Eden,  the  Village  Com- 
munity, which  man  has  lost  through  the  insidious 
intrusion  of  the  serpent.  Individual  Ownership  in 
land.  Undoubtedly  in  such  a  return,  there  must 
be  some  alterations  of  the  original  Eden,  there 
must  be  some  adjustment  to  the  new-comers  who 
cannot  be  expected  to  throw  off  at  once  their  civil- 
ized hal>its  and  the  inherited  ideas  of  centuries. 

The  most  interesting  and  instructive  of  these 
writers,  as  far  as  we  have  read,  is  M.  Emile  de 

21 


322  SOCIAL   INSTITUTIONS. 

Laveleje  in  his  book  on  Primitiv(^  Property,  pub- 
lished some  twenty  years  ago.  Says  he:  "In 
every  commune  a  portion  of  territorj'^  should  be 
reserved  and  divided  in  temporary  possession 
among  all  the  families,  as  is  done  in  the  forest 
cantons  of  Switzerland."  He  advises  the  new 
communities  forming  in  America  and  Australia  to 
shun  Individual  Ownership  in  land,  "  the  strict 
and  severe  right  of  property  borrowed  from 
Eome,"  in  order  to  avoid  the  evils  of  feudalism, 
absolutism,  and  demagogueism.  He  can  only 
see  the  destruction  of  liberty,  if  social  inequality 
is  allowed  to  continue,  and  through  his  whole 
book  runs  an  elegiac  undertone  of  melancholy 
regret  as  he  looks  back  from  modern  civilization 
to  the  Village  Community  which  forms  the  main 
subject  of  his  work.  M.  de  Laveleye  takes  the 
old  Teutonic  Mark  in  its  Swiss  form,  as  the  social 
unit  to  which  we  should  return,  of  course  with 
certain  modifications. 

Other  writers  have  bid  us  look  to  the  Slavo- 
nic Village  Community  as  the  healing  principle  of 
the  social  ills  of  "Western  civilization.  Not  a  few 
Russian  writers  maintain  that  the  Slavonic  race  is 
to  be  the  new  regenerator  of  Europe.  As  the 
Germanic  tribes  came  down  upon  effete  antiquity, 
and  rejuvenated  it  with  the  Teutonic  Mark,  so 
Russia  with  its  mir  is  to  perform  a  like  work  for 
the  modern  world.  Back  we  must  go  again  to 
the  social  beginnings  of  man  for  a  fresh  plunge 


SOCIETY.  323 

into  the  fountain  of  youth,  this  time  the  Shivonic 
fountain.  The  future  of  Europe  belongs  to  us, 
says  Pan-Slavism. 

I  do  not  know  whether  anybody  has  suggested 
that  we  push  still  further  to  the  East,  and  try  the 
Hindoo  Village  Community  as  the  remedial  source 
of  our  social  woes.  Some  Western  folks  are  re- 
turning to  India  for  their  religion,  for  Buddhism 
and  for  Theosophy.  Some  others  may  be  in- 
clined to  go  thither  for  their  social  institutions. 

There  is  great  difficulty  in  adopting  the  Vil- 
lage Community  in  any  form.  Its  people  have 
essentially  but  one  vocation,  that  of  agriculture. 
A  few  artisans  may  exist  among  them,  but  no 
diversified  industry.  Modern  society  calls  forth 
many  vocations  and  develops  many  talents  be- 
sides that  of  tilling  the  soil  and  simple  artisan- 
ship.  Still  we  must  not  underrate  this  thought 
of  man's  returning  upon  himself  and  beginning 
over  again  at  the  social  starting-point,  when  he 
thinks  he  has  gone  wrong,  and  we  may  well  take 
a  lesson  from  the  persistence  of  that  original  unit 
of  human  association,  the  Village  Community, 
and  its  power  of  rising  and  reproducing  itself  in 
men's  souls  after  centuries  of  suspended  activity. 
I  do  not  look  upon  these  ideal  schemes  as  mean- 
ingless, they  are  deeply  hintful,  and  show  the 
leaven  that  is  working  in  the  time,  being  prog- 
nostications of  the  coming  order. 

Modern  society,  turned  back  into  the  Village 


324  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Comniimity,  however  widened  the  latter  may  be 
for  its  reception,  would  have  to  give  up  its  prin- 
ciple of  individual  exploitation ;  the  grand  diver- 
sity of  talent  and  vocation  Avould  have  to  be 
somehow  leveled  down  if  not  destroyed.  The 
just  freedom  of  the  individual  would  certainly 
suffer  in  any  such  process  —  at  least  that  free- 
dom as  conceived  by  Anglo-Saxon  peoples.  Hence 
these  have  had  their  own  prophet  in  the  present 
sphere. 

2.  The  dualism  between  the  individual  and  the 
community  is  now  to  be  fully  acknowledged,  and 
each  is  to  be  assigned  to  its  own  realm  where  it 
is  to  be  granted  everything  that  rightfully  be- 
longs to  it.  Thus  what  we  have  called  Civic 
Communism  assumes  a  new  phase  in  the  move- 
ment of  social  reform;  the  Civil  Community 
(town,  city,  State)  is  not  only  to  own  but  also  to 
take  back  all  property  in  land,  to  resume  the 
ownership  of  the  soil,  Avhich  it  had  in  the  Village 
Community,  and  of  other  values  quite  unknown 
to  primitive  society.  On  the  other  hand  the  in- 
dividual is  to  be  left  as  free  as  ev^er  (unless  in- 
deed he  be  a  landholder) ;  in  fact,  he  is  to  be 
liberated  from  certain  burdens  which  encumber 
his  present  activity,  for  instance  taxation. 

Many  thinkers  have  pointed  out  the  diiference 
between  property  in  land,  which  is  not  the  product 
of  man's  will,  and  property  in  other  things  which 
are  products  of  man's    will.     John  Stuajt  Mill 


SOCIETY.  325 

more  than  questions  the  right  of  private  owner- 
ship in  the  soil,  and  Herbert  Spencer  assails  it 
strongl}^  in  his  Social  Statics.  But  the  man  who 
above  all  others  has  enforced  this  phase  of  Civic 
Communism  is  Hemy  George.  He  gave  his  life 
to  its  propagation ;  his  books  tell  it  to  the  peo- 
ple, w^ho  have  read  them  throughout  the  English- 
speaking  world.  To  him  chiefly  must  be  ascribed 
the  fact  that  modern  communal  ownership,  as 
just  described,  has  become  a  permanent  part  of 
Anglo-Saxon  consciousness,  which,  as  yet  sub- 
jective and  internally  fermenting,  has  neverthe- 
less begun  slowly  but  very  perceptibly  to  realize 
itself  in  new  forms  of  Civic  Communism. 

George's  scheme  has  difficulties  which  render 
it  impossible  to  be  adopted ;  at  certain  points  it 
violates  established  riffhts  to  such  a  deg-ree  that 
it  becomes  repugnant  to  the  sense  of  justice  in 
most  men.  At  the  same  time  it  shows  forth  with 
convincing  clearness  and  emphasis  the  proprietary 
right  of  the  Civil  Community  upon  which  Indi- 
vidual Ownership  has  encroached  to  the  injury  of 
society  and  to  the  detriment  of  individual  free- 
dom. Thus  George's  doctrine  has,  as  is  usually 
the  case,  both  a  positive  and  a  negative  element, 
and  therein  becomes  contradictory  and  self- 
destructive  ;  in  one  part  it  assails  established 
right  in  order  to  establish  right  in  another  part, 
both  parts  belonging  to  the  social  system. 

So    the    question  rises  whether  this    negative 


326  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

element  can  be  eliminated  or  corrected,  and  the 
positive  element  introduced  into  the  social  move- 
ment without  violatino;  vested  rights.  This 
brings  up  a  new  and  indeed  the  latest  phase  of 
Social  Evolution,  to  which  as  the  final  outlook 
upon  the  future  a  few  words  may  be  given. 

3.  The  communal  Will  is  not  to  despoil  the 
individual  Will,  nor  is  the  individual  Will  to 
despoil  the  communal  Will;  both  are  integral 
elements  of  the  social  order,  and  each  is  not  only 
to  allow  passively  the  other  to  exist,  but  is  pos- 
itively to  secure  this  existence.  No  spoliation  of 
the  individual  by  the  community  or  of  the  com- 
munity by  the  individual;  on  the  contrary,  each 
is  directly  to  protect  and  to  promote  the  other. 
Or,  to  express  this  thought  psychologically,  the 
two  Wills,  the  communal  and  the  personal,  the 
universal  and  the  individual,  are  to  will  each 
other  and  thus  make  themselves  truly  institu- 
tional. So  the  man  becomes  on  his  side  ethical, 
he  wills  actualized  Free-Will,  which  is  the  in- 
stitution, the  community,  while  the  latter  on  its 
side  returns  to  him  and  secures  his  Free-AVill. 
All  this  has  reference  here  to  property,  which  is 
a  realization  of  Will,  be  it  communal  or  personal. 

Such  is  the  general  principle,  which  has,  how- 
ever, quite  a  distance  to  travel,  before  it  can 
become  the  complete  fact.  The  increased  value 
of  the  soil  and  of  other  things,  which  results 
from  coininunal   activity,  should    belong  to  the 


SOCIETY.  327 

commuuity,  which  ought  not  to  be  despoiled  of  it 
by  the  individual,  as  is  too  often  the  case.  Fran- 
chises which  are  really  a  form  of  communal  prop- 
erty should  not  be  disposed  of  to  private  parties 
without  adequate  compensation  to  the  community, 
their  owner. 

One  may  well  ask  what  has  caused  the  com- 
munity thus  to  abandon  its  ownership,  which  in 
former  times  was  acknowledged  and  defended  in 
law.  There  can  be  hardly  a  doubt  that  it  is  one 
pernicious  result  of  the  doctrine  of  laissez-faire 
which  permeated  Europe  in  recent  times.  The 
legislative  theory  of  Bentham,  which  has  had 
great  influence  throughout  all  Anglo-Saxondom, 
throws  quite  everything  to  the  individual,  and 
hamstrings  the  commuuity  as  owner.  Undoubt- 
edly this  kind  of  legislation  has  had  its  important 
work  to  perform  in  delivering  the  individual  from 
former  legal  restrictions  placed  on  his  freedom. 
Among;  other  thino;s  it  has  secured  religious  toler- 
ation  and  economic  liberty  by  wiping  out  old 
ecclesiastical  and  sumptuary  laws.  But  in  order 
to  serve  personal  freedom,  it  has  announced  the 
universal  doctrine  of  non-interference  with  the 
individual ;  the  State  is  to  do  nothing,  its  attitude 
toward  the  economic  world  must  be  largely  pas- 
sive. Thus  the  communal  Will  as  manifested  in 
town,  city,  State,  was  shoved  into  the  back- 
ground by  the  thinker,  by  the  legislator,  and  by 
public   ()])inion,  whil(^  the  individunl  AVill,  turned 


828  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

loose  in  anew  world,  reared  among  other  wonders 
the  colossal  structure  of  modern  industrialism. 
This  excessive  indulgence  of  individualism  has 
called  forth  evils  which  have  led  to  a  decided 
reaction  toward  a  new  assertion  of  the  communal 
Will. 

Legislation  has  found  it  necessary  to  drop  its 
former  principle  of  non-interference  in  the  laws 
relating  to  child-labor,  and  to  impose  restrictions 
of  various  kinds  in  the  commercial  and  industrial 
spheres.  The  community  has  discovered  that  it 
must  interfere  for  the  individual  against  the  in- 
dividual in  this  great  modern  struggle  of  individ- 
uality. In  the  matter  of  education,  sanitation, 
protection  of  many  communal  interests,  the  doc- 
trine of  laissez-faire  is  decidedly  set  aside. 

It  is  worth  while  to  observe  that  there  are  cer- 
tain public  questions  round  which  the  battle 
between  the  communal  and  the  individual  Wills 
specially  rages,  with  victor}^  sometimes  on  one 
side  and  sometimes  on  the  other.  This  is  par- 
ticularly true  of  the  temperance  question,  which 
conn&t  settle  itself ;  or  if  it  does  settle  itself  in  any 
given  community  (town,  city.  State),  it  has  usu- 
ally a  tendency  to  unsettle  itself  in  that  same  com- 
munity. Such  a  result  does  not  spring  wholly 
from  the  power  of  the  liquor  dealer,  as  is  often 
said,  but  rather  from  the  uncertainty  of  the  citi- 
zen, who,  not  interested  in  the  liquor  traffic  and 
not  addicted  to  drink,  questions  the  right  of  the 


SOCIETY.  329 

communal  Will  to  interfere  with  the  individual 
Will  in  enacting  the  so-called  temperance  laws. 
Evidently  here  lies  a  borderland  not  yet  decis- 
ively won  by  either  of  the  contesting  sides. 

Still,  in  general,  the  present  tendency  is  toward 
a  more  positive  exercise  of  the  communal  Will, 
as  the  guarantee  of  a  higher  freedom.  The 
means  of  transportation  and  intercommunication 
(the  railroad,  the  telegraph  and  telephone),  arc 
in  their  nature  communal,  and  in  the  end  will 
have  to  reckon  with  the  communal  Will  in  its  in- 
stitutional form ;  exactly  how,  the  future  must 
settle.  Already  street  railroads  are  owned  and 
operated  by  some  cities,  and  every  city  is  con- 
sidering the  problem.  Franchises  are  no  longer 
to  be  thrown  away  or  used  as  a  means  of  corrup- 
tion.    Such  is  the  trend  of  the  time. 

On  the  other  hand  there  is  not  the  remotest 
likelihood  of  even  a  partial  return  to  the  old  Vil- 
lage Community,  though  in  one  way  we  are  going 
back  to  communal  ownership.  Nor  is  there  any 
probability  of  a  resumption  of  the  land  by  the 
community.  Indeed  all  the  land  of  the  earth, 
even  that  which  is  still  unoccupied,  seems  destined 
to  pass  through  the  crucible  of  Individual  Owner- 
ship. And  for  this  a  good  reason  is  apparent : 
the  energy  of  man  is  called  forth  in  its  highest 
potency  by  his  personal  interest;  the  soil  must 
be  his  own  as  well  as  the  fruits  of  his  toil,  if  he 
is  to  do  his  best.     To  the  untrammeled  tenure 


330  .SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

of  laud  by  the  individual  is  doubtless  due  the 
brilliant  agricultural  conquest  of  North  America. 
And  the  same  thing  is  happening  in  other  parts 
of  the  globe.  Evidently  the  free  man  is  going 
to  possess  the  soil  and  not  be  possessed  by  it  in 
any  shape. 

There  is  to  be  communal  ou'nership,  but  it  is 
realizing  itself  in  a  different  way  from  that  con- 
ceived by  jNI.  de  Laveleye  and  Henry  George. 
Still  these  men  will  always  be  remembered  and 
honored  for  their  services  in  the  general  cause  of 
the  Community's  rights,  even  if  the  stream  does 
not  run  in  their  channel. 

Thus  the  grand  movement  of  Society  has  com- 
pleted its  cycle,  which,  however,  is  not  station- 
ary, but  in  the  perpetual  process  of  development. 
Manifestly,  we  have  come  back  to  our  starting- 
point  which  was  Positive  Society,  whose  evolu- 
tion we  have  just  traced,  after  witnessing  its 
nesrative  descent.  But  this  does  not  mean  that 
the  circle  is  closed  and  that  the  movement  stops. 
We  reached  the  point  in  which  the  civil  Com- 
munity is  calling  for  a  new  communal  ownership, 
which  is  to  be  established,  confirmed  and  secured 
bv  Law.  But  who,  what  makes  the  law?  Here 
we  have  the  call  for  the  State,  the  next  great 
secular  Institution,  whose  special  function  is  to 
secure  the  free-acting  AVill  through  Law.  The 
social  Will  in  every  form  must  finally  invoke  the 
State  as  its  protector,  ;is  that   Institution   which 


(SOCIETY.  331 

is  to  make  it  actual.  Thus  Society  presupposes 
the  State  for  its  existence  on  the  one  hand,  and 
on  the  other  passes  over  into  the  State  as  the 
next  higher  form  of  institutional  development. 

Some  Observations  on  Society.  We  have  now 
seen  that  the  three  fundamental  stages  in  the 
movement  of  Society  are  the  Positive  or  normally 
existent,  the  Negative  or  descending,  and  the 
Evolutionary  or  ascending.  We  have  also  seen 
that  they  are  not  stages  fixed  and  separate,  but 
in  a  continual  process  with  one  another,  which 
process  is  necessarily  psychical,  being  that  of  the 
very  Self  Avliich  produces  Society.  This  same 
order  we  have  already  found  in  the  Family. 

1.  We  may  now  look  back  and  verify  the  state- 
ment made  at  the  beginning  of  the  present  chap- 
ter, that  Society  turns  upon  tJie  willed  Product 
Avith  its  manifold  development  and  transforma- 
tion, culminating  in  the  universal  middleman 
(not  yet  quite  universal  but  rapidly  tending 
thitherwards).  This  willed  Product,  becoming 
more  and  more  complicated,  is  finally  the  all- 
willed  Product,  which  Society  is  to  mediate  both 
in  its  production  and  its  distribution.  With  this 
mediation  of  the  willed  Product  all  the  great 
social  conflicts  of  the  time  are  connected  —  round 
it  move  social  revolution  as  well  as  social  evolu- 
tion. Its  name  leads  us  back  to  the  Will  as  the 
source  of  the  social  order,  whoso  scientific  dc- 
\<lopniciit  should,  accordingly,  he  psychological. 


332  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

2.  The  willed  Product  is,  in  general,  Prop- 
erty, the  object  into  which  the  "Will  has  put  it- 
self, and  through  which  it  has  its  first  real 
existence.  Proudhon,  the  socialist,  seeking  to 
do  away  with  the  present  form  of  Society,  showed 
his  perspicacity  in  centering  his  attack  upon 
Property,  that  is,  individual  ownership  of  it. 
"  Property  is  theft,"  is  his  famous  declaration, 
which  concentrates  in  one  keen  sentence  the  fun- 
damental faith  of  sociahsm. 

3.  The  man  whom  we  have  above  designated 
as  the  social  Monocrat,  is  the  most  interesting 
figure  in  the  civilized  world  to-day.  The  people 
of  both  continents  are  looking  at  him  with  a  kind 
of  awe,  wondering  what  will  develop  out  of  him 
next.  No  President  of  a  Republic,  no  King  or 
Emperor  attracts  the  gaze  and  provokes  the  spec- 
ulation of  mankind  like  our  Monocrat.  Three  or 
four  of  them  have  attained  colossal  proportions 
which  are  beginning  to  reach  around  the  globe, 
And  the  curious  fact  about  this  matter  is  that  he 
is  the  product  of  Democracy,  to  which  Monoc- 
racy seems  to  be  the  rising  counterpart  and  ful- 
fillment. One  might  think  that  the  political 
Monarch  and  the  social  Monocrat  belong  to- 
gether ;  not  so,  however.  Socialism  as  such  can- 
not evolve  itself  practically  in  the  Social  Whole; 
it  has  been,  is,  and  will  probabh"  continue  to  be 
a  doctrine,  an  ideal  scheme.  But  Monocracy  is 
here,  and   in   possession,  socially  evolved  and  at 


SOCIETY.  333 

work  in  the  world,  born  doing  while  socialism  is 
still  talking. 

4.  It  is  the  Monocrat  who  is  forcing  commu- 
nal ownership  as  the  counterpoise  to  himself, 
and  is  destroying  the  last  vestige  of  the  old  doc- 
trine  of  laissez-faire.  He  is  compelling  the  State 
to  be  a  positive  Institution,  to  take  hold  actively 
and  to  secure  Free- Will,  and  not  to  look  on  idly 
and  let  things  run  their  own  course.  Unques- 
tionably the  Monocrat  is  a  direct  and  legitimate 
product  of  social  evolution,  and  so  has  supremely 
the  right  to  be.  Yet  he  may  abuse  his  right  and 
become  a  tyrant,  establishing  a  social,  if  not  a 
political,  despotism.  Here,  then,  is  the  loud  call 
for  the  State  to  safeguard  freedom  against  him ; 
still  it  is  not  to  destroy  him,  but  rather  to  secure 
him  on  his  positive  side.  The  social  Monocrat 
has  come  to  stay,  as  he  fulfills  a  legitimate  social 
function,  that  of  the  universal  unification  of  man 
as  a  social  being,  not  through  the  revolution,  but 
through  the  evolution  of  the  Social  Order. 

5.  As  yet  the  social  Monocrat  is  purely  indi- 
vidual in  his  work,  is  seeking  his  own  personal 
gain.  Is  this  the  end  of  him,  or  is  he  being 
evolved  for  another  and  higher  social  purpose? 
We  think  that  he  is  in  training  for  becoming 
the  recognized  institutional  administrator  of  the 
Social  Whole,  which  is  finally  to  choose  him  in 
some  way.  At  present  he  seizes  his  power 
through  his  talent  and  uses  it  for  himself  auto- 


334  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIOXS. 

crjitjcally ;  l)ut  lie  is  to  liscoul  of  this  iiidivid- 
itulistic  condition,  and  work  for  all  sociall}^  and 
not  simply  for  himself.  He  will  administer  the 
social  Institution,  not  from  the  outside,  but  from 
the  inside,  being  an  organic  constituent  thereof, 
and  as  such  his  end  will  be  the  ultimate  end  of 
all  Institutions,  the  actualizing  of  freedom  in  the 
world.  His  authority  will  no  longer  be  capricious 
or  even  patriarchal,  but  institutional,  perchance 
constitutional,  hke  the  President  of  the  United 
States.  A  federated  social  world  might  make 
him  its  chief.  For  such  exalted  service  he  would 
receive  adequate  compensation,  which,  however, 
is  not  to  be  altogether  settled  bj' himself  for  him- 
self. It  would  seem  that  the  coming  commu- 
nal ownership  is  already  calling  for  him,  and  he 
is  now  in  the  process  of  preparation  for  his 
future  institutional  vocation. 

6.  Thus  the  Social  Monocrat  would  be  no 
longer  dano^erous  to  freedom,  at  least  not  more 
than  any  ruler.  In  fact,  his  supreme  function 
would  be  to  secure  to  the  social  individual  a 
higher  freedom  than  has  ever  been  possible  with- 
out him .  Every  man  must  obey  t he  Social  Whole, 
not  as  a  slave,  but  as  a  freeman,  who  surrenders 
his  arbitrary  Will  and  receives  through  the  Insti- 
tution his  own  Free-Will  sanctioned  by  all  and 
not  by  himself  alone.  Such  a  Free-AVill  the  So- 
cial ]SIonocrat  may  be  able  to  make  more  valid 
than  ever  it  was  before,  since  he  is  not  necessa- 


iiOCIErY.  335 

rily  cuiitined  by  national  limits,  but  can  be  in  liis 
way  a  kind  of  worid-ruler. 

7.  Tlie  new  movements  and  conflicts  of  tlie  So- 
cianVhole  liave  found  and  are  finding  decided  ex- 
pression of  themselves  in  art  and  literature.  The 
modern  novel  in  particular  has  busied  itself  with 
the  collisions  in  this  sphere,  and  has  repeatedly 
sought  to  portray  a  workman's  Paradise,  as  well 
as  his  Inferno ;  we  read  too  of  the  Temple  of 
Labor  and  the  Palace  of  Industrj^  But  archi- 
tecture has  actually  built  the  multiplicity  of  the 
social  Product  in  these  days  into  the  so-called 
High  Building,  which  is  indeed  the  architectonic 
image  of  the  Social  Monocrat  both  in  its  external 
colossality  and  in  its  manifold  internal  divisions. 
Sculpture  has  come  down  from  its  Greek  Olym- 
pus, and  instead  of  revealing  a  God,  presents  to 
us  the  stalwart  form  of  the  digger.  Even  more 
emphatically  is  Painting  adjusting  itself  to  the 
new  social  movement. 

8.  At  present  the  social  Monocrat  is  his  own 
steward  or  administrator,  not  that  of  Society,  at 
least  not  institutionally  so.  He  may  give  or  not, 
he  may  will  freedom  or  not,  quite  as  he  pleases. 
Hence  he  must  be  put  under  the  law  of  the  State, 
first  of  all,  then  he  with  his  social  power  and 
ability  may  well  become  an  integral  portion  of 
the  State,  and  can  be  brought  to  will  Free-Will 
not  subjectively  according  to  caprice,  but  ob- 
jectively through  the  Institution,  in  whose  ad- 
ministration he  will  naturally  take  part. 


CHAPTER  THIRD.— THE  STATE. 

The  third  phase  of  the  secular  institutional 
world  has  been  already  designated  as  the  State 
or  the  political  Institution.  In  it  we  behold  a 
new  form  of  the  Self  institutionalized,  which 
signifies,  in  general,  that  the  individual  is  not 
merely  to  execute  his  Will  immediateh%  but 
mediately,  through  the  Institution  whose  func- 
tion is  to  return  to  the  individual  and  secure  his 
Will.  Already  we  have  observed  this  fact  in  the 
two  previous  secular  Institutions,  domestic  and 
social.  But  the  political  Institution  manifests 
the  same  general  fact  in  its  own  peculiar  way :  it 
returns  to  the  individual  Will  and  secures  it 
through  the  Laio,  which  is  the  expressed  and  en- 
forced command  of  the  State  having  just  this 
end,  namely,  to  secure  the  individual  Will,  which 
(336) 


THE  STATE.  337 

in  its  turn  must  secure  the  State.  Thus  is  the 
individual  as  such  institutionalized  by  the  State 
with  its  Law.  Or  we  may  say  he  is  made  uni- 
versal in  his  conduct  through  the  Law,  is  civil- 
ized or  made  a  citizen  (civis),  and  can  live  in  a 
civil  order  with  other  citizens,  who  also  will  the 
Law,  which  thus  expresses  the  universal  Will. 
The  institutional  man  as  secular  bears  in  himself 
the  three  stages :  he  is  husband  or  father  (do- 
mestic), he  is  worker  (social),  he  is  citizen 
(political). 

The  State  is,  accordingly,  a  secular  Institution 
(as  distinct  from  the  religious  one),  since  it 
makes  actual  the  individual  Will  in  its  first  or 
immediate  phase,  not  yet  broken  or  separated 
within  itself,  which  latter  form  the  religious  In- 
stitution actualizes.  Here  we  must  carefully 
draw  an  important  distinction.  The  secular  In- 
stitution demands  also  obedience  to  itself;  the 
State  subordinates  the  individual  Will  to  law  and 
authority,  and  the  individual  Will  subordinates 
itself  to  the  same,  yet  always  in  order  to  secure 
and  make  actual  itself  as  immediate ;  but  the  re- 
liffious  Institution  demands  the  broken  and  con- 
trite  heart,  the  self -surrender  to  the  Divine  Will. 

The  State  is  the  highest  secular  Institution, 
since  it  is  the  most  complete  embodiment  and  in- 
stitutional counterpart  of  the  Ego,  the  self-con- 
scious, the  self -knowing  and  self-willing.  The 
State  is  a  WiU,  objective,  existent  in  the  world, 
22 


338  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

a  Will  also  knowing  itself  as  Will  which  is  to  will 
the  Free- Will  of  the  Individual,  and  is  to  utter 
this  fact  of  itself  through  the  Law.  The  State, 
however,  is  not  an  Ego  or  Person,  but  is  func- 
tioned by  the  Person,  yet  not  in  his  individual 
capacity,  but  as  the  universal  Will  which  knows 
itself  and  expresses  itself  as  universal  in  the  Law. 
All  this  has  to  be  done,  undoubtedly,  by  a  self- 
conscious  Ego,  an  individual  Person,  who,  how- 
ever, stands  for  and  voices  and  executes  the  Will 
as  universal. 

The  rudest  State  has  some  kind  of  authority, 
that  authority  must  be  aware  not  only  that  it  is 
Will  (such  as  the  individual)  but  also  that  it  is  to 
will  Will  impersonally  or  impartially,  without 
regard  to  any  so-called  personal  considerations. 
Authority  is  exercised  by  a  Person  who  is  to 
make  himself  impersonal,  and  is  to  rule  not  for 
his  own  personal  advantage  or  that  of  any  other 
Person  in  opposition  to  the  public  good.  First  of 
all  he  is  to  voice  the  Law,  and  through  it  to  come 
back  to  the  individual  Person,  whose  Will  must 
be  passed  through  the  universal  alembic  before  it 
can  be  made  valid.  Not  every  desire  or  act  of 
Will  need  be  explicitly  legalized,  or  judicially 
sanctioned  in  order  to  be  carried  out;  still  the 
good  citizen  will  seek  to  fulfill  no  wish  which  is 
not  legal,  or  at  least  implicitly  affirmed  by  the 
Law. 

Every  act  of  the  individual  Will  implies  the 


THE  STATE.  339 

State,  and,  if  carried  out  to  its  complete  conse- 
quences, would  create  the  State.  This  is  a 
thought  which  a  student  of  the  present  subject 
maj  well  develop  for  himself.  The  simplest  act 
of  his  Will  is  his  Self  objectified,  which  means 
not  merely  that  he  makes  some  object  into  which 
he  puts  himself,  but  that  his  Will  makes  an  object 
which  is  itself  Will,  Will  existent  and  active  in 
the  world  outside  of  him,  whose  purpose  is  to 
will  Will,  which  purpose  is  consciously  formu- 
lated in  the  Law  of  the  State,  or  Statutory  Law. 
The  process  of  the  Will  is  therein  completely  ob- 
jectified in  a  new  form  of  Will  uttering  itself  in  a 
command  whose  sole  content  is  itself  as  Will. 
The  State,  therefore,  is  not  to  be  abolished  as 
long  as  men  have  Wills,  being  not  simply  their 
realization  in  a  thing  or  a  deed  but  their  actuali- 
zation in  an  objective  universal  Will  which  asserts 
its  universality  in  the  Law  and  its  supremacy  over 
all  individual  Wills  through  the  Law. 

Thus  in  the  State  we  say  that  the  individual  is 
for  the  first  time  truly  actual,  he  actually  or  law- 
fully exists,  his  being  in  the  world  is  secured  and 
guaranteed  by  the  Law.  Previously  he  existed 
naturally,  even  if  innocently;  the  State  seals 
with  its  legality  Family  and  Society,  securing 
both  and  elevating  both  into  universality  through 
the  Law.  As  long  as  man  is  merely  caprice, 
merely  subjective  or  individual  Will,  he  is  not 
complete,  he  is  not  free;   he  gets  possession  of 


340  SOCIAL  lySTITUTION'S. 

his  Free-Will  only  through  the  State,  which 
truly  authorizes  it,  gives  to  it  authority  even  over 
himself.  Man  must  act  lawfully,  his  Will  must 
be  willed  authoritatively;  otherwise  he  is  not 
free  or  merel}'  free  subjectively,  not  objectively 
and  universally.  Institutional  freedom  is  the 
great  end  of  man,  but  institutional  freedom  itself 
is  not  complete  till  it  be  affirmed  by  the  State 
commanding  it  by  the  Law. 

We  have  already  in  the  two  previous  chapters 
set  forth  and  dwelt  upon  the  universal  element 
both  in  Family  and  in  Societ}'.  They  have  also 
an  individual  Will  whose  end  is  to  bring  out  what 
is  universal.  In  the  Family,  however,  this  uni- 
versal element  is  instinctive,  unconscious,  based 
on  sexual  impulse,  which  drives  the  individual 
into  the  domestic  Institution.  An  instinct  (or 
Will  in  an  immediate  natural  form)  it  is,  which 
is  also  possessed  by  the  lower  orders  of  creation. 

In  the  Social  Order  this  universal  element  is 
recognized  by  every  individual  member ;  he  rec- 
ognizes that  he  must  give  his  labor  (the  product 
of  his  Will)  in  order  to  get  the  product  of  his 
neighbor's  Will.  In  this  recognition  lies  the 
possibility  of  Property ;  but  the  recognition  is 
subjective,  individual  as  3'et,  merely  moral,  till 
the  State  steps  in  and  enforces  the  same  by  Law, 
carries  out  and  makes  actual  that  recognition  of 
the  individual  Will.  My  moral  duty  is  to  recog- 
nize others'  Property,  but  if  I  do  not,  the  State 


THE  STATE.  341 

(or  the  universal  Will  actually  at  work  in  the 
world)  must  compel  me.  I  have  no  choice  in 
the  matter,  except  the  choice  of  being  good  or 
bad. 

It  is  true  that  all  Institutions  have  in  them  a 
command  —  a  command  from  the  actualized  in- 
stitutional Will  to  the  individual  who  belongs  to 
the  membership.  The  Family  or  domestic  In- 
stitution commands  me  (the  parent  or  child)  to 
obey  its  behest ;  Society  or  the  social  Institution 
commands  me  (the  co-worker  in  it)  to  follow  its 
principle.  But  the  State,  the  political  Institution 
commands  me  (the  citizen)  through  the  Law 
which  is  the  preceding  commands  of  Family  and 
Society  formulated,  adjudicated  and  executed  — 
wherein  we  see  at  work  the  special  Institution 
(the  State)  whose  function  is  to  make  valid  the 
principle  of  other  Institutions.  The  Family  alone 
cannot  vindicate  the  Law  of  the  Family.  Society 
alone  cannot  enforce  the  Law  of  Society.  The 
institutional  Will  must  have  an  Institution  whose 
supreme  object  is  to  secure  that  Will.  Thus  the 
State  is  the  Institution  which  safeguards  all  other 
Institutions,  itself  included.  The  implicit  Law 
in  Family  and  Society  is  to  become  the  explicit 
Law  of  the  State,  which  has  to  utter  it  (the 
Law),  to  bring  it  home  to  the  consciousness  of 
the  people,  and  to  administer  it  impartially  to 
all. 

The  State  has,  therefore,  not  only  to  make  but 


342  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

to  make  known  the  Law,  which  thereby  becomes 
conscious  and  explicit  in  the  mind  of  the  people. 
Law  has  its  primal  source  in  the  spirit  of  the 
time  and  the  nation,  but  is  then  merely  potential, 
subjective,  conceived  but  not  born;  the  State 
has  to  evoke  it  from  such  a  condition,  to  formu- 
late it,  and  to  set  it  to  work  in  the  world.  Still 
further,  the  State  is  to  publish  the  Law,  so  that 
the  individual  can  act  always  in  view  of  it,  so 
that  his  AVill  can  know  and  consciously  will 
the  universal  Will.  The  Law  may  be  called  the 
lang-uaoe  of  the  State,  throus^h  which  the  State 
not  only  imparts  its  commands,  but  also  becomes 
in  a  sense  conscious  of  itself,  or  self -knowing, 
similar  to  the  Ego,  whose  essential  act  is  also  to 
be  self -knowing.  Herein,  too,  we  may  see  why 
the  deepest  comprehension  of  the  State  must  be 
psychological,  as  it  is  an  institutional  counterpart 
of  the  Ego  objectified  even  in  the  latter' s  self- 
conscious  action.  The  State,  therefore,  has  to 
actualize  the  individual  "Will  not  simply  as  gen- 
eric (as  in  the  Family),  not  simply  as  phj'sically 
reproductive  (as  in  Society),  but  as  a  self -know- 
ing Will  through  the  Law.  By  means  of  the 
State  expressing  its  institutional  commands  in  the 
Law,  which  the  individual  hears  and  understands, 
he  conies  to  know  himself  as  universal  Will  which 
wills  expressly  the  Will  of  all,  and  so  renders 
institutional  life  possible.  And  from  the  same 
point   of   view  the   State  is  to    get  the  implicit 


THE  STATE.  343 

actualized  Will  out  of  Family  and  Society  and 
utter  the  same,  thus  malting  it  explicit  and 
conscious  to  its  participants,  who  become  there- 
by fully  responsible  for  its  violation,  and  also 
more  profoundly  free  through  the  knowledge  of 
what  secures  their  freedom. 

The  State  on  one  side  may  be  looked  at  as  a 
development  out  of  the  Family,  as  the  latter  has 
the  authority  of  the  parent,  who  naturally  and 
immediately  utters  the  Law  of  the  Family,  which 
primordially  was  the  ultimate  Law.  Thus  we 
have  the  early  Patriarchate  in  which  Family  and 
State  are  not  yet  differentiated.  But  the  inher- 
ent movement  of  Free  Will  separates  the  State 
from  the  domestic  Institution  and  gives  to  it  its 
own  special  function,  which  is  to  make  the  Law 
universal,  whereas  in  the  Family  the  Law  is  indi- 
vidual, being  uttered  aixd  administered  directly  by 
the  paternal  ruler,  according  to  his  own  insight  or 
caprice.  Undoubtedly  the  Law  has  always  to  be 
administered  by  an  individual,  but  not  in  his  own 
right ;  it  nmst  be  passed  through  the  crucible  of 
the  State,  fornmlated  and  made  universal,  ere 
the  individual  as  judge  or  executor  can  apply  it 
to  the  individual  again.  Of  course  in  the  Family 
or  in  the  early  Patriarchate  the  individual  father 
or  patriarch  declares  and  executes  the  Law  im- 
mediately, that  is,  without  the  above-mentioned 
mediation  of  the  State. 

The  ancient  law-giver  represented  a  great  ad- 


344  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

vance  in  the  unfolding  of  the  State  toward  its 
supreme  end,  which  is  to  actualize  Free- Will  in 
and  through  the  Law.  He  is  the  one  with  whom 
the  ancient  States  properlj^  begin  their  organic 
political  life;  he  reduces  a  mass  of  humanity 
composed  of  struggling  individuals,  families  and 
clans  to  his  Law,  which  he  utters  and  usually 
writes  down,  and  then  administers  till  it  becomes 
ingrained  in  the  consciousness  of  his  people.  He 
is  the  Law-giver  because  he  first  of  all  separates 
his  individual  Will  from  the  universal  Will  and 
establishes  the  latter  as  the  Law  which  all  are  to 
obey,  since  thereby  each  and  all  can  have  what  is 
their  own  without  strife.  Deservedly  famous 
are  such  men  in  the  record  of  the  World's  His- 
tory; they  organize  the  State  [civitas),  train  its 
citizens  (cives),  and  through  both  bring  forth 
civilization,  which  is  begotten  and  advanced 
through  the  State. 

The  old  Greeks,  that  most  fertile  of  all  peo- 
ples intellectually,  produced  the  most  and  the 
best  lawgivers  in  the  secular  field.  Two,  the 
Spartan  Lycurgus  and  the  Athenian  Solon,  are 
specially  distinguished,  and  seem  to  have  been 
the  originators  of  the  civil  order  of  their  respec- 
tive cities,  establishing  in  them  the  two  main 
political  tendencies,  democratic  and  aristocratic, 
which  are  still  in  full  vigor  among  modern  peo- 
ples. The  Hebrews  had  also  their  great  law- 
giver, Moses,  who  was  religious  rather  than  sec- 


THE  STATE.  345 

ular.  Rome  had  likewise  its  early  Numa,  but  in 
Roman  history  the  individual  lawgiver  vanishes 
into  the  lawgiving  State,  impersonal  as  the  Law 
itself.  And  that  was  the  outcome  of  the  law- 
giver in  Greece  also ;  Pericles  as  well  as  Grac- 
chus were  not  lawgivers  in  the  old  sense,  though 
they  proposed  and  carried  laws.  In  the  modern 
world  likewise  tlie  ancient  personal  lawgiver  can- 
not appear,  he  has  vanished  into  the  legislature, 
or  rather  into  the  three  functions  of  the  State, 
legislative,  judicial  and  executive,  for  he  seems 
to  have  been  all  three.  Again  we  may  note  that 
out  of  one  lawgiving  Ego  springs  the  whole  fabric 
of  the  lawgiving  Institution,  the  State,  which,  as 
already  remarked,  is  an  objective  and  institu- 
tional counterpart  of  the  self -knowing  and  self- 
willing  Ego. 

The  State  has  its  essence  not  in  love,  but  in 
law,  or,  if  we  put  the  two  terms  together,  not  in 
the  law  of  love  but  in  the  love  of  law,  to  which 
the  individual  is  to  yield  himself  in  order  to  find 
himself.  The  immediate  emotion  of  the  Family 
which  is  love,  is  now  objectified  into  a  command- 
ment which  subsumes  the  man  through  his  intel- 
ligence. He  must  know  the  law  in  order  to  be 
truly  a  member  of  the  State,  while  he  must  feel 
the  legal  bond  as  a  member  of  the  Family. 

The  State  is  law-making,  law-adjudicating, 
law-executing ;  its  inner  process  turns  about  the 
law,  which  is  the  utterance  of  itself  in  a  three- 


346  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

fold  movement  corresponding  to  the  movement 
of  the  Ego.  The  so-called  tripartite  division  of 
governmental  powers  —  legislative,  executive  and 
judicial  —  has  a  psj^chical  origin  and  must  be 
referred  back  to  that  origin  for  its  final  vindica- 
tion. 

When  we  say  that  the  State  must  execute  the 
law,  we  ascribe  to  it  a  Will,  and  a  Will  Avhose 
content  is  the  law,  the  universal  mandate  which 
the  individual  must  obey  or  Avill,  since  obedience 
is  a  phase  of  Will.  The  State  we  regard  not  as 
an  Ego,  yet  as  a  Will,  which,  however,  has  to 
be  administered  and  vitalized  by  an  Ego  or  Per- 
son filled  with  its  universal  content.  This  is 
what  makes  the  State  objective  Will,  which  as 
object  has  to  be  made  active  by  the  subjective 
Will  of  the  Individual. 

We  have  aheady  noticed  that  the  State  is  in 
one  way  a  return  to  the  Family  whose  institu- 
tional authority  it  has  afiirmed  and  made  explicit 
in  the  Law,  freeing  that  authoritj'  of  its  individ- 
ual form.  But  the  same  character  it  bears  toward 
all  institutions,  and  not  alone  toward  the  Family  ; 
that  is,  the  State  is  the  institution  whose  law  is 
to  express  and  to  unfold  every  form  of  institu- 
tional Will,  Family,  Society,  Church,  confirming 
the  same  by  its  Law,  To  take  the  case  of  the 
Church,  the  State  as  Will  secures  the  religious 
Will  in  its  right,  which  is  essentially  to  utter  and 
to  organize  itself  in  an  institution.     Yet  the  State 


THE  STATE.  347 

does  not  (at  least  in  its  most  modern  form) 
actualize  the  religious  Will  in  an  ecclesiastical  in- 
stitution ;  it  simply  affirms  and  safeguards  such  a 
Will  in  its  institutional  activity,  as  it  does  the 
Family  and  Society;  or,  we  may  say,  the  State 
actualizes  in  the  Law  the  religious  Will  actualiz- 
ing itself  in  its  own  institution.  The  State  is  that 
form  of  actualized  Will  which  secures  every  form 
of  actualized  Will,  including  itself.  Thus  we  may 
see  that  the  State  is  the  institution  which  returns 
to  the  institution  and  wills  the  Will  Avilling  the 
same.  The  State  does  not  (at  least  in  its  most 
modern  form)  compel  the  individual  to  enter  the 
Family;  but  if  he  so  wills,  it  guarantees  to  him 
his  Will.  Here  we  may  again  say  that  the  State 
does  not  actualize  the  Family,  but  it  actualizes 
the  actualization  of  the  Family. 

Thus  we  behold  again  the  Psychosis  of  secular 
Institutions  in  their  three  forms  —  Family, 
Society,  State.  Their  process  with  one  another 
has  been  already  set  forth  (see  preceding  pp. 
44-58),  and  need  not  be  here  repeated. 

At  this  point  we  shall  have  to  drop  the  further 
consideration  of  the  State,  which  deserves  a  far 
fuller  treatment  than  is  possible  in  the  present 
work.  The  Anglo-Saxon  State  is  the  most  im- 
portant institutional  phenomenon  of  modern  times, 
and  seems  destined  to  unify  politically  the  whole 
world.  The  nations  of  Europe  have  already 
adopted    largel}-     its  governmental    forms,    not 


348  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

through  force  but  of  their  own  inner  movement. 
In  the  United  States  the  political  Institution 
must  be  regarded  as  the  transcendent  spiritual  fac- 
tor of  the  countr}',  and  the  element  of  chief 
interest  to  other  nations.  We  can  only  say  at 
present  that  we  hope  soon  to  give  an  exposition 
of  the  State  adequate  to  its  importance,  from  the 
psychological  point  of  view,  which  is  the  funda- 
mental one  for  it  as  well  as  for  all  other  Institu- 
tions. The  few  pages  just  given  will,  we  trust, 
be  sufficient  to  show  the  general  meaning  of  this 
Institution  as  w^ell  as  its  interconnection  with  the 
rest,  so  that  the  institutional  process  will  be 
fairly  complete  in  the  mind  of  the  reader. 


SECTIOR  SECOND.  — THE  RELIG- 
IOUS IRSTITUTION^. 

The  difference  between  the  secular  and  the  re- 
ligious worlds  in  a  vague,  general  way,  is  present 
to  us  all ;  but  when  we  come  to  make  this  distinc- 
tion concrete  in  the  mind,  and  to  render  it  definite 
by  careful  formulation,  we  find  that  our  task  is 
not  easy,  and  is  not  to  be  accomplished  of  a  sud- 
den. We  return  to  our  statement  time  after 
time,  remodel  it,  and  work  it  over  and  over,  ere 
the  distinction  becomes  a  part  of  our  conscious 
])ossessions.  In  some  such  fashion  the  author 
may  ask  his  reader  to  look  at  several  ways  of 
stating  the  same  fundamental  thought,  and  to 
turn  it  over  and  over  in  print  first,  then  in  th€ 
mind. 

Human  Will  makes  itself  actual  in  an  Institu- 
tion through  willing  itself ;  thus  human  Will  re« 

(349) 


350  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

turns  to  itself  and  confirms  itself  by  reason  of 
the  Institution  which  is  secular.  On  the  other 
hand,  human  Will  makes  itself  actual  in  an  Insti- 
tution through  willing  God's  Will;  thus  the 
human  Will  returns  to  itself  and  confirms  its  own 
self-surrender  hy  means  of  an  Institution  which 
is  religious.  In  the  foregoing  parallel  we  put  the 
stress  upon  the  attitude  of  the  human  or  individ- 
ual Will,  that  of  self-assertion  and  of  self -sur- 
render, which  is  to  be  affirmed  by  the  two 
Institutions  respectively. 

Looking  at  the  same  thought  from  a  some- 
what different  point  of  view,  and  using  diiferent 
terms,  we  ma}^  say  that  the  secular  Institution  is 
the  finite  Will  actualized,  willing  finite  Will  with 
its  finite  ends  in  domestic,  social,  and  political 
life ;  hence  the  secular  Institution  secures  imme- 
diate human  Will  mediately  (that  is  through  the 
Institution).  On  the  other  hand  the  religious 
Institution  is  the  infinite  Will  actualized,  that 
which  wills  the  absolute  Will  which  is  the  Good, 
the  ultimate  or  ideal  end  of  the  universe.  Hence 
the  religious  Institution  may  be  deemed  from 
this  point  of  view  the  absolute  Institution,  as  it 
is  just  the  Institution  of  the  Absolute  (as  Divine 
Ego  or  Person). 

As  the  secular  Institution  affirms  and  makes 
valid  the  immediate  human  Will  mediately 
through  its  Institution,  so  the  religious  Institu- 
tion affirms  and  makes  valid  the  broken,  penitent, 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  351 

self-renouncing  human  Will  mediatelj,  through 
its  Institution,  in  which  the  human  Ego,  giving 
up  its  finite  self,  gains  the  infinite  Self,  and  thus 
finds  the  infinite  reconciliation,  wherein  also  lies 
perfect  freedom.  For,  as  we  shall  often  empha- 
size, God  is  supremely  Free- Will,  not  capriciously, 
but  institutionally  free,  that  is.  He  is  a  Free- 
Will  which  wills  Free- Will  in  man,  who,  in  turn, 
is  to  will  God's  Free- Will,  also  through  the 
Institution. 

"My  Will  be  done,"  is  secular.  "Not  my 
Will,  but  Thine  be  done,"  is  religious. 

In  these  two  utterances  the  institutional  element 
is  purposely  left  out,  in  order  to  show  more  dis- 
tinctly its  starting-point  in  the  Will  for  both 
Institutions.  My  Will  is  not  alone  to  be  done 
immediately,  but  is  also  to  be  afllrmed  directly  or 
indirectly  by  the  Law ;  the  surrender  of  my  Will, 
though  it  has  its  immediate  phase  at  the  begin- 
ning, is  not  to  remain  in  its  state  of  scission,  but 
is  to  be  accepted  and  reconciled  in  and  through 
the  Church. 

Here  we  should  explain  that  the  State  and  the 
Church,  though  usually  coupled  together  and  con- 
trasted, are  not  correlatives,  or,  so  to  speak, 
symmetrical  Institutions.  The  Church  belongs 
strictly  to  Christendom,  and  is  an  historic  evolu- 
tion of  the  religious  Institution,  the  List  in  time; 
while  the  State  is  merely  one  form  of  the  secular 
Institution  running  through  all  time.     The  State 


»/ 


352  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

is  simplv  another  -word  for  the  political  Institu- 
tion, but  the  Church  is  by  no  means  another 
word  for  the  religious  Institution.  Hence  other 
terms  must  be  usually  employed  both  for  corre- 
spondence and  contrast.  The  nomenclature  here 
followed  takes  the  word  Institution  in  order  to 
express  the  principle  common  to  both,  and  dif- 
ferentiates them  respectively  by  the  adjectives 
secular  and  religious. 

The  reader  may  have  noted  that  we  continually 
speak  of  the  religious  Institution,  not  simply  of 
religion,  which  is  so  much  talked  of  in  these 
days  as  something  entirely  apart  from  any  insti- 
tutional embodiment.  The  organization  of  re- 
ligion as  an  existent  objective  Institution  is  our 
present  theme,  though  the  soul  of  this  organism 
should  be  religion,  just  as  the  soul  of  the  State 
should  be  patriotism, 'and  the  soul  of  the  Family 
should  be  domestic  love.  Still  this  soul  for  all 
human  purposes  must  be  incorporate  in  a  bod}'^ 
of  its  own,  and  the  two  must  work  together  to 
produce  religious  life  and  activity.  It  is  a  sign 
of  the  time  that  so  much  is  written  and  thought 
upon  religion  and  so  little  upon  the  religious 
Institution,  without  which  religion  has  never  ex- 
isted, indeed  can  have  no  existence  except  as  a 
subjective  affair.  One  may,  and  in  a  sense  must, 
love  God  without  any  Church,  just  as  one  may 
Y I  I  love  a  woman  without  any  marriage ;  but  the  true 
fruition  of  both  kinds  of  love  is  the  correspond- 


TEE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  353 

ing  Institution,  in  one  case  the  Church  and  in 
the  other  the  Family.  The  subjective  side  of  the 
Institution  is  not  to  be  left  out  nor  is  it  to  be  left 
to  itself  without  objective  reality.  Protestant- 
ism in  this  respect  has  shown  itself  weak,  it  has 
never  been  quite  able  fully  to  institutionalize 
itself;  it  smote  the  old  Church,  and  has  never 
recovered  from  its  own  blow. 

All  peoples  have  their  religious  Institution, 
quite  as  much  as  they  have  their  domestic  or  their 
political  Institution.  The  human  animal,  how- 
ever low  he  may  be,  has  some  form  of  the  God- 
consciousness,  else  he  were  not  human;  the  get- 
ting conscious  of  the  divine  Ego  is  the  first  birth 
of  the  human  Ego,  and  with  it  the  first  birth  of 
the  religious  Institution,  even  though  this  be  the 
merest  mumbo-jumbo.  In  such  a  stage  all  Insti- 
tutions are  mingled  together  in  a  kind  of  institu- 
tional  protoplasm,  which  bears  in  itthepossibihty 
of  the  future.  Later  we  shall  see  the  Church 
evolve  itself  out  of  this  primordial  cell,  as  we  may 
call  it,  through  a  long  series  of  religious  forms. 

It  has  been  already  indicated  that  the  religious 
Institution  springs  out  of  the  God-consciousness 
in  man,  his  recognition  of  the  absolute  Ego  in  his 
own  Ego,  Religiosity  differs  from  secularity  in 
this :  the  Ego  as  particular  wills  not  some  partic- 
ular end  or  form  of  itself,  but  wills  the  universal 
Ego  as  such,  the  pure  form  of  the  Self.  Every 
particular  Ego  is  to  pass  through  the  alembic  of 

23 


354  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIONS. 

the  absolute  Ego  and  become  universalized,  where- 
by it  is  made  religious  ;  to  bring  about  this  process 
in  the  human  soul  is  the  function  of  religion  and 
its  Institution. 

In  the  modern  world,  and  also  in  the  medieval, 
the  relation  between  the  secular  and  religious  In- 
stitutions is  usually  expressed  by  that  between 
State  and  Church.  These  two  terms,  though 
not  universally  applicable  as  correlates,  can  be 
emplojed  as  such  within  their  proper  limits. 
Both  State  and  Church  are  tribunals  sitting  in 
judgment  upon  man  and  his  deed ;  the  one  judges 
him  by  his  outer  or  overt  act,  which  has  to  be 
proven;  the  other  judges  him  by  his  inner  Self 
or  disposition,  looking  into  his  heart  and  seeing 
what  is  there.  The  one  asks :  Has  this  deed 
violated  man's  Will  as  expressed  in  the  Law? 
The  other  asks:  Has  this  deed  violated  God's 
Will  as  expressed  in  the  Conscience?  The  two 
judges  ought  not  to  reverse  each  other,  still  they 
do  sometimes. 

The  State  wills  the  Free- Will  to  be  Free- Will 
through  the  Law,  not  through  the  absolute  Free- 
Will  itself.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Church  wills 
the  Free-Will  to  be  Free- Will  through  God's 
Will  or  the  absolute  Free-Will  as  Person,  which 
Will  is  actualized  in  the  religious  Institution,  and 
thereby  confirms  or  rather  consecrates  all  Free- 
Will.  The  Church,  then,  with  its  absolute  Per- 
son  as   Free-Will  willinsf  Free-Will  is  the  final 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  '-^ob 

home  and  })iolt'cti()n  of  all  freedom,  though  it 
has  often  shown  itself  the  very  opposite,  and 
may  become  the  worst  kind  of  a  tyrant,  the 
soul's  tyrant. 

Thus  the  religious  Institution  furnishes  the 
spiritual  foundation  for  the  freedom  of  the  secu- 
lar Institution.  The  State  is  often  said  to  be 
based  on  religion,  and  we  may  see  how  this  is  so, 
if  the  great  object  of  the  State  is  to  secure  Free- 
Will.  The  Church  is  to  fill  every  man  with  the 
spirit  of  the  absolute  Person,  who  is  Free 
Will  —  wiUing  absolutely  Free- Will  through  His 
Institution,  and  bringing  the  same  home  to  every 
soul.  At  least  such  is  the  ideal  purpose  of  the 
Church,  whatever  may  be  its  reality.  Each  secu- 
lar individual  in  a  world  of  freedom  ought  to  be 
a  member  of  the  religious  Institution  in  order  to 
receive  the  highest  inspiration  for  that  freedom. 
The  State  has  as  its  center  the  abstract  universal 
Law  which  from  without  enforces  Free  Will ;  the 
Church  has  as  its  center  the  concrete  universal 
Free-Will  itself,  which  from  within  enforces  Free- 
will, and  is  thus  the  source  of  all  Law. 

So  we  may  say  that  the  Divine  Will  or  the  ab- 
solute Ego  is  implicit  in  the  secular  Institution, 
but  explicit  in  the  religious  Institution.  The  Law 
as  such  is  not  in  form  Free-Will,  though  this  be 
its  content;  but  God  is  Free-Will,  both  in  form 
and  content.  All  finite  desire  is  to  be  made  in- 
stitutional through  Family,  Society,  State;  but 


356  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

even  this  finite  desire  is  ultimateh^  to  become  in- 
finite, or  the  desire  of  the  Infinite,  the  desire  for 
God,  the  absolute  Free- Will.  In  fiua  voluntade 
e  la  nostra  pace,  says  Dante,  the  Christian  poet, 
in  an  oft-cited  verse.  But  the  Heathen  poet, 
Homer,  also  says,  "All  men  desire  God," 
affirming  the  universality  of  religion,  or  of  the 
God-consciousness.  In  the  Finite  is  involved  the 
Infinite  as  its  creative  presupposition.  The  re- 
ligious Institution  must  descend  into  the  secular 
Institution,  and  be  perpetually  re-vivifying  and 
re-creating  the  same  through  its  spirit,  which, 
as  the  actualization  of  universal  Free-Will,  is 
.the  origin  and  end  of  the  entire  institutional 
world. 

How  this  is  to  be  done  is  not  here  said,  but 
only  that  it  is  to  be  done.  The  religious  Institu- 
tion has  asits function  to  keep  alive,  and  to  safe- 
guard the  universal  institutional  principle,  which 
is  its  own,  making  the  same  eternally  productive 
in  the  human  Ego,  which  in  the  religious  Institu- 
tion is  to  will  universal  Free-Will  as  the  absolute 
Person  himself,  and  which  is  thereby  filled  with 
the  very  soul  of  all  institutional  freedom.  In  the 
secular  Institution  the  Divine  Will  is  present  and 
at  work,  but  not  revealed  in  its  own  nature;  but 
in  the  religious  Institution  man  wills  God's  Will 
openly,  explicitly  as  the  absolute  Self,  Creator 
of  his  individual  self  and  of  the  universe.  This 
is  the  spirit  underlying  and  creating  the  secular 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  357 

Institution,  though  the  form  be  finite  and  rela- 
tively external  in  its  spliere  of  action. 

The  religious  Institution,  as  already  stated,  has 
passed  through  a  multitude  of  forms  in  the  course 
of  its  development,  but  its  culmination  lies  in  th<3 
Church  completely  actualized  as  an  Institution, 
for  which  at  present  there  are  many  longings  and 
earnest  gropings.  God  can  be  free  only  in  a 
free,  that  is,  institutionally  free.  Church.  The 
so-called  Free  Religion  is  hardly  an  institutional, 
but  rather  a  capricious.  Religion.  The  freeman, 
however,  cannot  have  a  capricious  deity,  but  one 
who  wills  freedom  through  the  Institution.  As 
the  absolute  Free-Will  which  wills  Free-Will, 
God  is  the  unlimited,  the  infinite;  the  limitation 
of  evil  is  not  upon  him.  Did  he  create  evil? 
He  gave  Free-Will  to  man  who  has  the  power  of 
negating  Free-Will,  which  is  the  principle  of  all 
evil.  Such  negative  power  lies  in  the  very  gift 
of  freedom :  freedom  is  free  to  undo  itself.  Yet 
man's  Free-Will,  the  supremely  divine  gift,  can 
will  absolute  Free-AVill  whose  end  is  to  create 
Free-Will ;  thus  man  is  good,  using  his  freedom 
always  to  secure  freedom.  This  is  the  ideal  end 
of  Ethics,  which  we  have  elsewhere  called  Insti- 
tutional Virtue,  in  Avhich  man,  the  human  Free- 
Will,  has  as  the  active  and  conscious  content  of 
his  life,  the  willing  of  Free-Will  through  Institu- 
tions. (See  the  author's  Will  and  its  World, 
p.  565.)     Miin   may    bo   simply    ethical   in   the 


358  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

secular  institutional  world  through  the  abstract 
moral  Law,  but  his  destiny  is  to  rise  to  the 
religious  Institution  with  its  absolute  Free-Will 
as  Person  who  is  the  source  of  that  Law,  as  He 
is  the  supreme  Free-Will  willing  personally  Free- 
Will.  It  has,  in  general,  been  acknowledged 
that  Ethics  is  incomplete,  apart  from  religion 
with  its  absolute  Person,  though  not  all  ethical 
people  are  religious  and  some  are  anti-theistic. 

Man's  freedom  and  God's  freedom  are  corre- 
lates. The  question,  Is  man  free?  is  essentially 
one  with  the  question,  Is  God  free?  The  denial 
of  cither's  Free-Will  involves  the  other's,  and,  of 
course,  the  corresponding  Institution.  God,  too, 
must  have  His  Institution  in  order  to  be  truly 
free.  Only  thus  can  there  be  a  free  God  willing 
His  own  Free-Will  in  and  for  man.  But  man  in 
his  turn  must  will  Free-Will  in  God  through  the 
religious  Institution  in  order  to  secure  for  himself 
and  for  the  world  this  divine  Free-Will,  which 
otherwise  does  not  exist,  that  is,  institutionally 
exist.  Without  man  God's  Free-Will  is  not 
recognized  (there  being  no  other  recognizer), 
nor  is  it  actualized,  having  no  Institution  by 
which  it  can  be  made  actual.  Through  His 
Church  in  its  very  organization  God  says  to  man, 
"  I  need  you  for  my  complete  freedom,"  and  so 
oives  to  him  His  own  infinite  worth.  On  the  other 
hand  man  needs  God  for  his  complete  freedom, 
which,  however,  can  only  be  attained  through 


THE  BELIOIOUS  INSTITUTION.  359 

divine  freedom.  A  capriciously  free  God  above 
and  an  institutionally  free  man  below  makes  a 
contradiction  which  cracks  open  Heaven  and 
Earth  into  an  impassable  chasm.  Man  is  not 
better  than  his  God,  nor  is  God  better  than  His 
man ;  they  quite  correspond  in  the  Evolution  of 
the  Ages.  If  God  is  the  Father,  then  the  son, 
who  is  man,  is  absolutely  necessary  to  make  Him 
Father,  and  on  this  side  also  the  two  must  be 
conceived  as  correlates. 

Such  is  the  ideal  end  of  the  Church  even  if  it 
seems  slow  in  getting  there.  The  liberation  of 
God  is  the  supreme  movement  of  the  religious 
Institution,  as  the  liberation  of  man  is  the 
supreme  movement  of  the  secular  Institution, 
which,  however,  must  ultimately  derive  its  spirit 
from  the  God-consciousness.  As  man  wills  the 
Free-Will  of  himself  and  neighbor  through  the 
State  and  its  Law,  so  he  wills  absolute  Free-Will 
in  the  universe,  or  universal  freedom,  through 
the  Church,  and  thus  affirms  and  communes  with 
the  source  of  all  Law.  On  the  other  hand  this 
absolute  Free-Will  or  the  Divine  Person  obtains 
its  rational  and  institutional  freedom  through  the 
religious  Institution.  The  true  Church  is  not  a 
Divine  Patriarchate  with  its  capricious  absolutism 
on  the  part  of  God,  but  a  free  Institution  through 
which  He  actualizes  his  Free-Will.  For  God's 
Will  also  is  not  to  be  realized  immediately  in  re- 
lation to  man,  but  mediately,  through  an  Institu- 


360  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tion.  God  did  not  even  create  man  immediately, 
by  fiat,  but  let  Jiim  develop  into  the  God-con- 
sciousness, as  science  is  daily  proving.  Thus  be- 
gins the  religious  Institution  which  itself  develops 
from  the  supremacy  of  a  capricious  to  that  of  a 
rational  and  institutional  God. 

At  this  point  the  tremendous  question  forces 
itself  up  to  the  surface:  Is  God  then,  subject  to 
Evolution?  Man  is,  the  religious  Institution  is, 
the  God-consciousness  is  :  all  manifestations  which 
we  call  divine  seem  to  have  developed ;  indeed 
this  is  just  the  side  of  His  manifestation.  Is 
there  another  side  or  other  sides?  Evohition  is 
not  the  total  divine  process,  it  moves  simply  in 
one  direction,  which  alwaj's  calls  up  two  other 
questions:  From  what  and  to  what?  Ultimately 
from  and  to  one  and  the  same  object,  absolute 
Person  who  is  God  Himself,  the  creative  Ego  in 
all  things,  creative  not  by  special  fiat,  but  by  the 
universal  genetic  act  of  itself,  which  is  eternally 
producing  and  unfolding  itself. 

Tlie  Religions  Institution  as  separative.  The 
separation  between  the  secular  and  rehgious  In- 
stitutions is  a  fact  of  the  common  consciousness 
of  men,  and  is  brought  home  to  them  in  many 
different  ways  externally  and  internally.  Two 
distinct  realms  we  regard  them,  and  pass  from 
one  to  the  other,  making  the  transition  in  Space, 
Time,  and  Spirit.  The  ordinary  man  in  the  daily 
occupations  of  his  secular  life,  seems  to  be  with 


THE  BELI&IOUS  INSTITUTION.  361 

his  real,  immediate  Self ;  but  when  he  enters  the 
religious  life,  for  instance,  in  going  to  church,  he 
seems  to  be  in  the  presence  of  another  Self,  very 
different  from  the  finite  Self  with  its  finite  pur- 
suits and  ends.  This  dualism  between  secularity 
and  religiosity  is  the  basic  fact  in  the  psycholog- 
ical ordering  of  the  whole  institutional  world. 
In  the  beginning  man  possesses  or  shares  in  two 
Selves,  an  individual  subjective  Self  and  a  uni- 
versal objective  Self,  which  division  religion  is  in 
the  end  to  reconcile. 

The  religious  Institution  manifestly  separates 
itself  from  the  secular  Institution,  and  thus 
belongs  to  the  second  or  separative  stage  of  the 
total  institutional  movement.  It  is  the  separa- 
tive act  inherent  in  the  complete  Psychosis  of  all 
Institutions,  having  its  psychical  start  in  that 
fundamental  separation  between  the  two  Egos, 
the  human  and  the  divine,  the  separation  between 
the  individual,  finite  Person  and  the  absolute,  all- 
creative  Person. 

This  separation  will  pass  into  the  external 
world,  into  nature,  by  means  of  the  religious 
consciousness.  A  piece  of  ground  will  be  meas- 
ured off  and  made  sacred,  as  distinct  from  other 
ground,  thus  it  is  the  sacred  precinct,  or  the 
Greek  temenos  (coming  from  a  word  which  means 
to  cut  off).  Upon  such  ground  is  built  the  temple 
or  cathedral,  the  sacred  edifice,  whose  religious 
spirit  gives  rise  to  architecture,  which  was  to  con- 


362  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

struct  primarily  "God's  House,"  or  the  Home 
of  the  absolute  Person.  Then  we  have  also  the 
collection  of  such  edifices,  even  the  sacred  city, 
such  as  Jerusalem,  Mecca,  Benares,  Heliopolis  in 
ancient  Egypt.  The  Oriental  religious  conscious- 
ness seems  to  demand  the  sacred  city;  in  Europe, 
also,  we  ma}^  find  traces  of  the  same  tendency  in 
the  feeling  with  which  Rome  is  regarded  by  many 
Catholics. 

Special  forms  of  nature  are  seized  upon  by 
religion  and  consecrated  apart  from  the  rest  of 
nature.  There  is  the  sacred  river,  the  Nile  in 
antiquity,  and  the  Ganges  even  now;  the  sacred 
mountain  rises  up  heavenward  all  over  Asia,  past 
and  present,  a  ver}'^  suggestive  indication  pointing 
from  below  to  the  beyond ;  traces  of  the  same 
feeling:  we  mav  still  find  in  Greece  and  Italv,  for 
instance,  in  reference  to  Mount  Athos  and  Monte 
Cassino ;  old  Rome  had  also  its  famous  Mons 
Sacer,  and  ancient  Hellas  its  Olympus.  Many 
other  natural  objects  have  been  employed  by  this 
same  consciousness,  such  as  grots,  caves,  and 
even  trees  and  plants  (the  oak  of  Dodona  and  the 
soma  of  ancient  Arya).  But  the  most  obvious, 
striking  and  ever-present  separation  in  visible 
nature,  that  between  sky  above  and  land  below, 
has  been  seized  upon  by  the  religious  conscious- 
ness and  transformed  into  the  distinction  be- 
tween Earth  and  Heaven,  the  Here  and  the 
Hereafter,    the    mortal    and    the    immortal,  the 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  363 

sensible  and  the  supersensible  realms,  Man's  and 
God's  abode  with  many  other  connotations  based 
upon  the  distinction  between  the  secular  and  the 
religious  Institutions. 

Quite  as  impressive  and  far-reaching  is  the 
apartness  which  religion  has  set  into  Time. 
There  is  the  sacred  hour  of  prayer  (often  several 
of  them)  breaking  in  upon  the  worldly  day,  the 
sacred  day  intercalated  into  the  week,  the  holy 
week  and  the  holy  season  of  the  year,  also  the 
holy  year  or  jubilee.  Thus  religion  cuts  into 
and  divides  secular  time,  making  the  divisions 
and  taking  its  own;  indeed  all  ordering  of  Time, 
the  calendar  with  its  names  derived  from  saints 
and  gods,  was  primarily  religious  and  for  a  re- 
ligious purpose. 

Nor  must  we  neglect  to  state  the  fact  that  the 
same  separation  passes  over  into  spiritual  prod- 
ucts, for  instance,  into  writing.  The  Great 
Books  of  the  world  are  fundamentally  divided 
into  tAvo  kinds,  religious  and  secular.  The  Orient 
has  been  prolific  of  sacred  Books,  indeed  all 
literature  of  the  primitive  ages  was  regarded  as 
holy.  The  earliest  form  of  writing  is  probably  the 
Egyptian,  and  is  called  sacred  (^hieroglypliic) ; 
but  in  Egypt  also  there  arose  a  secular  form  of 
writing  used  by  the  people  {demotic)  as  distinct 
from  that  employed  by  the  priesthood,  the 
sacred  caste.  The  Occident  has  produced  no 
religious  Bible,  not  even  for  its  own  use,  though 


864  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

it  has  adopted  some  from  the  Orient ;  but  it  has 
produced  the  great  secular  Bibles  of  Literature 
(Homer,  Dante,  Shakespeare,  Goethe).  This 
fact  constitutes  a  striking  illustration  of  the  dis- 
tinction between  the  Asiatic  and  the  European 
minds  in  their  deepest  creative  sources.  The  one 
has  developed  specially  the  religious  Institution 
with  its  utterance  in  writing,  the  other  has  spe- 
cially developed  the  secular  Institution  with  its 
utterance  in  writing.  The  two  dispositions  or 
characters  which  have  been  created  by  the  two 
Institutions  and  transmitted  through  mankind 
have  divided  the  human  species  into  two  classes, 
whose  traits  are  respectively  this-worldliness  and 
other-worldliness.  The  great  poem  of  Christen- 
dom, The  Divine  Comedy  is  other-worldly  both 
in  form  and  content,  being  thrown  into  the  fu- 
ture and  seeking  as  its  end  the  presence  of  God 
Himself.  Thus  the  two  worlds  are  separated  by 
it,  yet  into  that  other  world  this  world  is  as  it  were 
plunged  —  being  adjudged,  punished,  rewarded 
accordingtothe  deed,  the  expression  of  Free- Will. 
Still  this  poem,  though  religious  and  other-worldly, 
is  not  a  religious  Bible,  but  a  literary  one ;  it  has 
called  forth  no  religious  organization  or  creed  or 
priesthood,  it  has  no  authority  except  what  it 
exerts  b.y  appealing  to  the  Free-Will  of  the  reader 
directly  through  its  words  and  not  through  a  re- 
ligious Institution  of  its  own  creation. 

Thus  upon  the  outer  world  of  the  senses  the 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  365 

separation  between  the  secular  and  the  reUgious 
reahns  is  impressed  in  manifold  ways.  Man,  on 
entering  the  sacred  precinct,  crosses  a  line  which 
brings  him  into  another  presence ;  he  becomes 
conscious  of  the  two  Selves  in  the  universe,  the 
individual  finite  Self  and  the  infinite  Self,  which 
are  then  to  be  made  one  by  the  religious  process. 
The  human  Ego  from  the  first  outward  sensation 
becomes  aware  of  the  Divine  Ego,  and  there  rises 
the  primal  intimation  of  the  God-consciousness, 
which  is  to  be  unfolded  into  its  full  activity  by 
the  completed  religious  Institution. 

Already  in  secular  life  this  consciousness  is 
present,  but  more  or  less  implicit.  Every  act  of 
sensuous  knowing  by  my  Ego  implies  the  univer- 
sal Ego.  Man  is  to  take  his  secular  life  and  have 
it  consecrated,  though  he  can  and  often  does 
secularize  his  religious  Institution,  and  corrupt  it 
into  a  means  for  personal  and  finite  gratification. 
But  that  which  is  implicit  and  the  hidden  source 
in  all  secular  Institutions  must  be  brought  out 
and  made  to  exist  in  its  own  right  with  its  own 
institutional  life. 

As  in  the  other  Institutions,  Family,  Society, 
etc.,  so  in  the  religious  Institution  we  shall  wit- 
ness the  three  stages  which  form  what  we  may 
name  the  institutional  process.  This  will  reveal 
the  inherent,  organizing  principle  of  the  present 
subject. 

I.   The  Positive  Religious  Institution,  which 


360  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

gives  the  present  form  in  which  the  God-con- 
sciousness has  institutionalized  itself  among  the 
most  advanced  nations.  This  we  have  to  recog- 
nize to  be  the  Christian  Church,  though  it  has 
many  differences  within  itself,  and  is  not  accepted 
by  many  civilized  peoples. 

II.  The  N^egative  Religious  Institution^  which 
shows  a  retrogressive,  destructive  element  in  re- 
ligion, which  may  become  hostile  to  other  Insti- 
tutions, to  Morals  and  to  itself,  and  which  finally 
organizes  its  hostility  to  the  God-consciousness 
into  a  religious  Institution  with  ritual  and 
creed. 

III.  The  Evolution  of  the  Iteligious  Institu- 
tiony  which  shows  the  ascent  of  the  God-con- 
sciousness in  man,  unfolding  into  more  and  more 
complete  forms  till  the  present  time,  whose 
religious  condition  seems  to  prognosticate  a  new 
universal  Institution  as  being  in  the  course  of 
formation. 

Such  is  the  Psychosis  or  the  inner  psychical 
movement  of  the  religious  Institution  in  its  total 
sweep,  corresponding  fundamentally  to  the  pro- 
cess of  the  Ego  itself,  which  has  created  it  and 
keeps  it  activ^e.  We  call  it  an  Institution,  since 
it  has  that  which  is  common  to  all  Institutions ; 
it  is  actualized  Free-Will,  an  objective  fact  in  the 
world,  whose  purpose  is  to  call  forth  and  confirm 
man's  Free-Will.  For  the  individual  can  be  free 
only  in  so  far  as  he  wills  the  universal  Will,  the 


THE  liELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  367 

Will  of  God,  who  then  canuot  help  helping  him 
in  turn  to  be  free. 

The  religious  Institution  is,  accordingly,  in  its 
ideal  purpose,  that  which  trains  man  toward 
universal  freedom,  giving  him  communion  with 
and  participation  in  the  absolute  Ego's  Free-Will. 
The  first  lesson  which  religion  teaches  him  is  to 
renounce  the  immediate  or  capricious  Will  and 
subordinate  it  to  the  one  Free- Will  w^hose  very 
essence  is  to  will  Free- Will  in  and  through  the 
Institution.  Thus  does  man  become  godlike  in 
proportion  as  he  becomes  institutionally  free. 

We  shall  now  expand  this  thought  of  the  relig- 
ious Institution,  and  observe  it  passing  through 
the  various  stages  which  have  made  it  such  a 
deeply  significant  phenomenon  fn  the  history  of 
mankind. 

I.  The  Positive  Religious  Institution. 

All  peoples,  lowest  and  highest,  have  some 
form  of  the  Religious  Institution.  This  with  us 
is  called  the  Church,  though  the  name  belongs 
only  to  Christendom.  The  Church  may  be  con- 
sidered the  most  complete  development  which  the 
Religious  Institution  has  yet  reached,  though 
inside  the  Church  there  are  many  gradations. 

The  Religious  Institution  is  to  keep  alive  and 
ever  present  in  the  human  Ego  the  consciousness 
of  the  absolute  Ego,  or  what  we  have  called  the 
God-consciousness.     The  psychical  process  of  my 


368  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Ego  in  the  simplest  act  of  knowing  implies  the 
divine  Ego ;  this  is  what  I  linow  or  make  my  own 
in  the  mere  object  of  external  vision.  But  that 
universal  mind  (or  Ego)  which  is  implicit  even  as 
my  sense-life,  must  be  made  explicit,  conscious, 
an  object  in  itself  and  a  presence  to  me.  Thus  I 
know  not  only  the  outer  thing  but  the  Creator  of 
it  and  of  all  things,  and  I  am  brought  into  com- 
munion with  Him,  so  that  I  can  know  and  will 
his  Will.  Such  is  the  function  of  Religion  alono; 
with  its  Institution:  through  my  knowledge  of 
externality  it  is  to  bear  me  forth  into  knowing 
the  creative  internal  Self  of  the  Universe. 

To  return  once  more  to  our  former  contrast, 
the  secular  Institution  secures  man  as  the  child 
of  man,  in  the  Family  man  as  generic,  in  Society 
man  as  having  wants,  in  the  State  man  as  a  self- 
conscious  Will  through  the  Law.  But  the  Relig- 
ious  Institution  secures  man  as  the  child  of  God, 
as  sharing  in  the  estate  of  the  absolute  Person, 
and  hence  secures  man  not  in  his  particular  exist- 
ence, but  in  his  spiritual  universal  Self,  which  is 
his  divine  inheritance. 

The  Church,  as  the  highest  form  of  the  Relig- 
ious Institution,  must  have  at  its  center  the  high- 
est conception  of  deity,  and  also  the  highest 
conception  of  humanity.  God  is  supremely 
Free-Will  not  capriciously  but  rationally,  that  is, 
institutionally  free.  The  Church  was  instituted 
both  for  human  and  divine  freedom :   such  is  its 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  869 

ideal  end,  which,  however,  will  require  some 
time  yet  for  its  complete  realization.  This  same 
ideal  end  lies  in  the  total  Relio-ious  Institution 
from  its  humblest  to  its  most  exalted  forms : 
God  has  made  it  in  order  to  actualize  freedom, 
both  his  own  and  man's.  The  two  kinds  of 
freedom  belong-  toijether  in  the  one  divine  Insti- 
tution,  thouo;h  often  declared  to  be  antao-onistic. 
It  may  be  said,  then,  that  the  Religious  Insti- 
tution is  created  by  absolute  Free-Will  in  order 
to  make  itself  actual,  that  is,  in  order  to  make 
creative  Free-Will  actual.  God  as  Creator  must 
create  a  creation  creative,  it  must  image  Him  in 
his  very  Self.  Now  this  primordial  creative 
process  of  the  absolute  Spirit  is  just  what  must 
be  revealed  as  the  generating  process  of  His  In- 
stitution. Accordingly  we  shall  behold  the  three 
following  stages  of  the  movement  of  the  positive 
Religious  Institution : 

I.  Theogonic;  the  self-unfolding  of  the  abso- 
lute Eo;o  within  itself.  Creator  and  Creation  are 
primordially  one  in  the  Self;  God  is  self-created, 
and  more  or  less  explicitly  shows  the  triune  pro- 
cess, 

II.  Cosmogonic;  the  unfolding  of  the  absolute 
Ego  into  the  world  or  cosmos ;  Creator  and  Cre- 
ation  are  separated  into  the  internal  and  external ; 
God  creates  another  than  Himself  —  Nature,  Man 
and  the  primal  Institution  —  which  form  a  three- 
fold process  with  one  another. 

24 


370  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

III.  Hierogonic;  the  unfolding  of  the  absolute 
Ego  into  its  own  Institution,  the  religious,  which 
is  in  the  world,  yet  is  the  separation  from  it  and 
the  return  to  God,  who  herein  becomes  institu- 
tional. 

In  Christendom  this  Institution  is  called  the 
Church,  which  is  declared  to  have  been  founded 
by  Christ,  and  the  science  of  which  is  named 
Ecclesiology  by  theological  writers.  The  Greek 
and  Latin  peoples  still  use  for  the  word  church 
the  Greek  ecclesia  or  derivatives  from  it;  Teu- 
tonic peoples  empk>y  some  form  of  the  word 
chwch,  which  is  usually  supposed  to  have  come 
from  the  Greek  also  (Kuriakon).  This  third 
stage  (Hierogonic)  separates  the  Holy  Institu- 
tion from  the  preceding  primal  institutional  form 
or  germ,  out  of  which  it  evolves  into  independ- 
ence. In  this  sense  we  can  say  also  that  God 
made  it,  since  it  is  the  absolute  Ego  unfolding 
into  His  Institution,  which  has  a  corresponding- 
development  in  the  human  Ego  unfolding  into 
God-consciousness,  which  is  established  and  made 
active  and  actual  by  the  sacred  Institution,  or  by 
what  we  have  here  called  the  Hierogonic  Process 
(^Hieron,  what  is  sacred,  or  the  sanctuary,  in 
Greek). 

The  term  Hierogonic  is  unusual,  but  it  seems 
necessary  in  order  to  correlate  the  third  stage 
with  the  other  two,  on  the  side  of  their  common 
creative  principle.     It  means  the   creation  of  the 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION:  371 

Sacred  Institution  in  a  double  sense,  as  passive 
or  created,  and  as  active  or  creating,  being  created 
by  the  absolute  Person  that  man  through  it  may 
eternally  re-create  Him  in  his  own  soul.  So  man 
from  his  side  also  creates  the  Church,  which 
otherwise  is  not,  or  is  a  lifeless  shell. 

Thus  the  absolute  Ego  institutionalizes  itself,  for 
it  has  to  have  its  Institution  as  well  as  the  human 
Ego.  Moreover,  the  divine  Institution  must 
have  an  institutional  content,  namely,  Free- Will. 
The  absolute  Eojo  wills  Free- Will  throug-h  its 
Institution,  and  thereb}''  is  institutionally  free, 
and  not  arbitrarily  so.  On  the  other  hand,  man 
wills  God's  Will  as  actualized  in  His  Institution, 
subordinating  himself  to  the  divine  Will  as  insti- 
tutional, or  as  conveyed  to  him  through  the  In- 
stitution, which  in  turn  secures  his  freedom,  that 
is,  his  institutional  freedom,  and  brings  him  to 
suppress  or  to  control  his  caprice  in  every  form  of 
particularity.  Through  the  Church  man  is  made 
truly  universal,  or  is  completely  socialized;  the 
Secular  Institution  is  not  enough  by  itself. 

Of  course,  this  must  be  the  institutional  Church, 
and  it  must  worship  the  institutional  God.  The 
deity  of  Mahomedanism  (not  to  speak  of  others 
nearer  home)  is  largely  capricious,  and  so  has  a 
Religious  Institution  which  generates  enthusiasm, 
devotion,  submission,  but  not  freedom. 

I.  The  Theogonic  Process.  Of  old  among 
peoples  there  has  been  some  form  of  Theogony, 


37  2  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

which  tells  of  the  Creation  of  the  Gods  (or  God). 
If  they  created  the  world,  who  created  them? 
Such  a  question  rises  with  the  infancy  of  the 
race  and  of  the  individual ;  we  hear  it  asked  by 
the  little  child  quite  with  the  dawning  of  speech 
and  reason.  If  the  divine  Person  be  supremely 
creative,  then  His  own  principle  must  be  applied 
to  Himself,  must  be  indeed  in  Himself  and  at 
work  there  first  of  all. 

It  is  to  the  Greek  world  that  we  owe  the  name 
and  the  conception  of  a  Theogony.  Under  this 
title  the  old  poet  Hesiod  has  given  a  systematic 
evolution  of  the  Greek  Pantheon  of  his  own 
age,  beginninor  with  Niojht  and  Chaos  which 
have  the  power  of  unfolding  out  of  themselves 
into  their  opposites,  Day  and  Light,  and  thus 
gradually  developing  into  the  Olympian  Gods. 
Such  is  the  daring  thought  not  only  affirmed  but 
carried  out  in  that  ancient  poem  called  Hesiod 's 
Theogony;  the  Gods,  too,  are  subject  to  evolu- 
tion. Mj'thical  flashes  of  the  same  sort  we  trace 
among  many  peoples.  Tylor  cites  a  Japanese 
account  of  creation :  while  the  earth  is  still  soft 
like  mud,  there  arises  out  of  the  mass  a  rush 
from  which  springs  the  land-forming  god.  The 
cosmical  Q^g  in  Hindoo  and  other  mythologies 
sometimes  produces  the  god,  and  sometimes  is 
produced  by  him. 

The  Theo2:onic  Process  is  an  inherent  element 
of  the  Christian  Relis-ion.     That  Jesus  is  the  Son 


THE  BELIOIOUS  INSTITUTION.  373 

of  God  is  affirmed  in  every  orthodox  creed  of 
Christendom.  The  part  of  the  mother,  Mary, 
has  also  a  very  important  place  in  the  history  of 
the  Church.  Out  of  the  Theogonic  conception 
springs  the  central  doctrine  of  Christianity,  the 
Trinity.  Its  threefold  movement  we  may  briefly 
consider. 

1.  God.  The  absolute  Person  or  Ego  is  the 
creative  principle  of  the  universe,  and  is  spe- 
cially the  organizing  center  of  the  Religious  In- 
stitution, whose  supreme  function  is  to  keep 
alive  and  active  in  the  human  Ego  the  conscious- 
ness of  God,  of  the  absolute  Ego.  In  the  Chris- 
tian Church  he  is  conceived  and  named  God  the 
Father,  the  domestic  head  and  generator  of  the 
universal  Family,  having  a  paternal  love  for  his 
children.  Also  he  is  conceived  as  the  maker  or 
artificer  of  the  world,  creating  it  by  fiat,  hy  an 
act  of  primordial  divine  AVill  and  governing  it 
through  eternal  justice  or  righteousness.  More- 
over God  is  conceived  as  haviufj  His  own  end  in 
creation,  and  hence  as  having  supreme  wisdom 
for  comprehending  and  attaining  the  highest 
end.  Love,  Justice  and  Wisdom  indicate  the 
psychical  nature  of  the  divine  Ego  in  Feeling, 
Will,  and  Intellect. 

This  same  psychical  process  of  the  universal 
Ego  is  stated  in  its  universality  (or  all-ncss)  in 
the  so-called  divine  attributes.  (1)  Omnipres- 
ence j  immediately  present  in  all  things,  even  iu 


374  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Space  and  Time;  ubiquitous,  existent  from  ever- 
lasting to  everlasting.  (2)  Omnipotence;  the 
absolute,  self -active  Will  creative  of  all  things, 
the  generative  source  of  the  world  and  man,  and 
of  all  their  happenings.  (3)  Omniscience ;  the 
absolute  mind,  which  knows  all  and  specially  it- 
self ;  the  supreme  self-conscious  Intellect. 

In  these  three  terms  theology  has  suggested  the 
triple  process  of  the  Divine  Ego  as  it  is  in  itself, 
for  they  are  not  simply  three  distinct  abstract  at- 
tributes but  are  also  one,  and  one  process.  This 
thought  leads  up  to  the  final  way  of  seizing  the 
absolute  Ego  as  the  inner  divine  Psychosis,  the 
primordial  creative  archetype  of  all  created  things, 
outside  of  which  nothing  can  exist.  It  is  the 
Divine  Mind  as  having  its  own  process  within  it- 
self, or  God  as  self -created.  It  is  the  absolute 
Psychosis,  originative  of  all  and  the  All;  thus 
we  may  call  it  the  Panpsychosis,  the  universal 
creative  process  of  the  universal  Ego. 

But  God  as  Father  is  still  potential,  not  yet 
truly  Father  till  the  Son  appears.  God  himself 
is  realized  in  the  fullness  of  time  by  the  birth  of 
the  divine  child  who  thus  brings  to  manifestation 
divine  fatherhood. 

2.  The  Son.  God  the  Son  is  the  created,  gen- 
erated, the  externalized  and  humanized,  and  yet 
a  member  of  the  divine  Family.  The  Second 
Person  appears  in  person,  is  just  the  divine 
appearance  in  the  world,  and  so  is  the  counter- 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  375 

part  of  the  First  Person.  This  is  the  stage  of 
separation  in  which  God  becomes  another  Ego, 
which  is,  however,  himself.  The  divine  Ego  is 
now  twofold,  is  two  Egos,  having  made  manifest 
its  own  primal  inner  self-separation.  Thus  God 
is  no  longer  potential  but  is  real,  He  has  obtained 
fatherhood  through  sonhood;  God  is  also  born 
anew  in  the  birth  of  the  Son,  "  our  Father  in 
Heaven  "  has  come  into  existence  through  Christ, 
the  son  who  addresses  Him  these  words  in  filial 
supplication.  Unless  the  divine  Person,  had  a 
divine  Son,  he  could  not  be  addressed  or  con- 
ceived as  Father.  The  Son  returns  in  spirit  and 
creates  or  re-creates  the  Father,  calling  forth 
His  love  and  calling  upon  Him  by  name,  which 
fact  establishes  their  relation. 

When  we  look  to  the  antecedents  of  the  Chris- 
tian Religion,  we  find  that  God  the  Father  is 
essentially  Aryan,  that  God  the  unrelated  ruler 
of  the  universe  is  Semitic.  Creation  by  fiat  is 
Semitic,  creation  by  divine  paternity  is  Aryan. 
The  Hebrew  and  Mahommedan  Bibles  do  not  con- 
ceive of  God  as  Father  fundamentally.  The  son- 
ship  of  Christ  must  be  pronounced  Arj^an;  Father 
Zeus  is  familiar  to  the  Greek  mind,  as  we  may 
note  everywhere  as  Greek  poetry  and  mythology, 
in  which  we  meet  with  many  heroes  who  are  sons 
of  the  Gods.  In  fact  all  the  Olj'mpians  are  chil- 
dren of  deities.  The  Semitic  and  Aryan  unite  in 
the  New  Testament.     Christ's  great  revolution  at 


376  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

this  point  was  to  make  the  Semitic  or  Oriental 
God  have  a  son,  who  was  also  human  and  so 
could  be  mediatorial.  Then  God  became  Father 
for  the  first  time,  at  least  the  Father  of  man,  and 
showed  love,  which  thereby  is  an  essential  element 
in  the  Christian  God-consciousness.  On  the  other 
hand  the  Hebrew  unfolded  God's  rio-hteousness, 
the  absolute  justice  of  the  world-ruler.  The 
Church  has  penetrated  into  the  wisdom  of  God 
and  uttered  the  same  in  the  words  of  its  sages 
and  theologians.  Thus  we  have  inherited  the 
Love,  Justice,  and  Wisdom  of  God. 

The  second  relation  of  the  Son  is  the  human 
one,  that  which  connects  Him  with  man.  Thus, 
Heis  twofold,  divine-human;  His  creation  and  sep- 
aration from  God  passes  into  His  nature  and  gives 
to  Him  His  double  selfhood.  Christ  is,  there- 
fore, "  the  Son  of  Man"  as  well  as  "  the  Son  of 
God,"  which  dual  fact  is  represented  in  His 
Theogony,  He  being  born  of  human  and  divine 
parentage.  In  His  human  origin  and  relation  He 
is  one  with  mankind,  is  man's  brother;  yet  Heis 
also  God's  Son,  and  His  divine  influence  moves 
in  both  directions :  He  calls  forth  in  God  father- 
hood and  in  mankind  brotherhood. 

He  passes  through  His  human  career,  which 
is  to  manifest  His  divine  sonship  by  making  all 
men  brothers.  In  His  time  Western  Asia,  and 
with  it  Judea  were  hellenized,  having  had  some 
three  centuries  of  Greek  supremacy  and  culture. 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  377 

In  the  religion  of  Greece  the  mortal  sons  of  the 
Gods  were  well  known  —  Hercules,  Achilles, 
Bellerophon.  But  divine  sonship  is  not  Hebraic, 
yet  the  time  has  come  when  the  childless  Semitic 
Jahveh  is  to  be  given  a  Son  —  and  this  is  the 
divine  gift  of  Jesus,  just  the  gift  of  Himself. 
And  with  this  gift  he  o;ives  to  man  also  a  new 
world-embracino:  gift,  that  of  universal  brother- 
hood,  all  men  being  with  Himself  the  sons  of  God. 

The  inner  movement  of  the  Second  Person  i.s 
contained  in  his  outer  life,  which  ended  in  death 
and  resurrection.  In  this  last  idea  we  are  to  see 
not  only  immortaht},  but  also  the  return  of  the 
Son  to  the  Father,  which  completes  the  process 
of  filiation.  The  son  of  man,  which  was  his 
human,  finite,  separated  side,  goes  back,  through 
its  negation,  to  being  the  Son  of  God,  with  which 
he  started.  Thus  he  rounds  the  inner  cycle  of 
the  Second  Person:  divine,  human,  and  both 
these  united  in  the  return. 

But  this  movement  of  filiation  is  not  to  end 
with  the  Second  Person's  restoration  to  God; 
thus  it  would  be  merely  an  individual  process, 
and  of  no  moment  to  the  rest  of  mankind.  Now 
the  process  of  divine  filiation  is  to  be  made  uni- 
versal, aU  persons  are  to  participate  in  it  and 
thereby  to  become  Sons  of  God.  Every  human 
Ego  is  to  be  filled  with  this  inner  movement  of 
the  Son,  for  it  is  fundamentally  the  movement 
of  the  Ego  itself,  and  can  unite  with  the  latter, 


378  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

and  can  lead  it  to  the  resurrection  and  the  life. 
This  is,  then,  the  very  Spirit  of  Christ,  usually 
designated  as  the  Third  Person  of  the  Trinity, 
which  we  may  next  briefly  consider. 

3.  TJie  Sjyirit.  Many  questions  rise  in  con- 
nection with  the  present  subject:  Why  Person? 
Why  third?  Why  Spirit  as  distinct  from  Christ 
and  even  God?  As  Spirit,  it  suggests  primarily 
separation  from  the  sensuous,  finite  manifestation 
of  itself;  it  is  pure  Spirit,  grasped  in  its  inner 
movement.  Coming  after  the  earthly  appear- 
ance of  Christ,  it  is  his  Spirit  as  distinct  from  its 
outer  happenings ;  it  is  his  Self  as  unfolded  and 
revealed  in  his  life,  hence  it  is  called  a  Person,  a 
new  Person  in  its  function.  The  Spirit  is  the 
pure  Psychosis  as  manifested  in  his  biography, 
as  externalized  in  the  deeds  and  events  of  his  in- 
dividual career,  and  such  a  Psychosis  belongs  to 
every  human  life,  whose  essence  is  seen  in  the 
process  of  its  iudwelling  Spirit  (its  Ego)  from 
birth  to  death. 

Thus  the  Holy  Spirit,  or  the  inner  psychical 
movement  of  the  Christ-life,  is  united  with  every 
human  life  or  every  living  Ego  by  the  very  pro- 
cess of  the  Self.  But  the  further  and  mightier 
fact  is  that  the  Holy  Spirit  through  Christ  is  the 
return  to  God,  and  bears  with  itself  thither 
every  human  Ego  that  is  truly  one  with  this 
Spirit.  Hence  the  doctrine  that  salvation  is  the 
work  of  the  Holy  Ghost.     It  is  the  Person  or 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  379 

Self  which  unites  all  Selves  to  the  absolute  Self, 
bringing  back  the  separated  or  estranged  Self 
(the  sinful  soul)  to  God.  As  Christ  Avas  the 
divine-human  and  the  return,  so  His  Spirit, 
which  is  the  Holj  Ghost,  taking  possession  of  the 
human  Spirit,  through  the  latter's  own  act  of  re- 
pentance, becomes  the  Healer,  Savior,  Mediator, 
for  every  individual  Self  in  the  Universe,  who  may 
be  in  a  state  of  alienation  from  the  Divine. 

Accordingh^  we  shall  see  in  the  Spirit  a  three- 
fold process,  which  belongs  to  it  necessarih^  as 
Ego  or  Person.  (1)  The  Spirit  of  Chri.st  as 
distinct,  as  having  completed  its  movement,  as 
separated  from  its  earthly  and  temporal  mani- 
festation. It  is  true  that  the  living  Christ  knew 
of  this  Spirit  and  mentions  it  and  orders  it  in  the 
Trinity,  as  it  is  the  very  process  of  the  Ego  and 
lies  in  the  nature  of  self-consciousness.  (  2  )  This 
Spirit  on  its  human  side  makes  itself  one  with 
man,  stirs  the  human  Spirit  into  its  deepest-self- 
activity  through  repentance,  which  pre-supposes 
separation  from  God  and  the  return.  (3)  This 
return  is  made  real  in  man  through  the  divine 
side  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  which  is  also  the  return 
to  God  in  and  along  with  the  human  Spirit. 
Thus  through  the  Holy  Spirit,  as  the  pure  Psy- 
chosis of  Christ  God  is  brought  to  man  and  man 
is  brought  to  God  in  forgiveness. 

Such  is  the  process  of  the  Trinity  with  its 
three  Persons  —  Father,   Son,  and   Holy  Ghost. 


380  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

From  the  beginning  it  has  been  felt  to  be  the 
central  fact  of  Christianity  both  practically  and 
theoretically.  It  restored  to  the  world  God- 
consciousness  when  the  latter  had  been  lost 
through  ancient  philosophy,  for  that  is  just  what 
really  happened.  This  primordial  act  Christian- 
ity is  still  re-enacting :  it  is  always  restoring  and 
reproducing  the  God-consciousness  in  man,  God 
as  the  Trinity  in  the  soul  and  in  life  and  in  the 
world,  from  whom  flow  love,  righteousness,  and 
wisdom  with  all  their  correlates  and  derivatives . 

Moreover,  a  new  utterance  through  this  new 
divine  process  arises  in  man  for  man.  The 
divine  Individual  manifesting  himself  in  a  finite 
mortal  career  through  Avhich  he  passed  back  to 
God,  calls  forth  a  corresponding  movement  in 
art,  in  science,  and  in  philosophy,  above  all  in 
literature,  creating  afresh  story,  song,  and  the 
popular  Mythus  of  Europe.  Chiefly,  however, 
it  produces  a  new  Holy  Book,  the  record  of  His 
life  and  fundamentally  the  utterance  of  His 
divine  Spirit,  which  Book  has  itself  been  mar- 
velously  creative,  being  the  parent  of  many 
books. 

The  Trinity  is  declared  to  be  a  mystery,  some- 
thing which  requires  a  special  spiritual  initiation. 
This  is  so,  it  is  removed  from  the  immediate  sen- 
suous fact,  and  compels  us  to  penetrate  to  its 
inner  meaning.  It  is  also  often  declared  to  be 
incomprehensible,  and  the  significance  of  three 


THE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  381 

Persons  in  one  is  not  fully  explicit  till  we  reach 
the  conception  of  the  Psychosis,  the  universal 
process  of  the  Ego  or  of  Spirit.  As  this,  we  not 
only  can  think  it,  but  we  cannot  think  anything 
else,  since  we  are  just  such  a  process  ourselves  in 
every  act  of  thought  or  of  knowledge. 

Here  we  may  note  the  famous  definition  of  the 
Trinity  given  by  the  Schoolmen:  one  Substance, 
three  Persons.  This  definition  no  longer  satisfies 
as  it  leaves  the  Trinity  in  a  dualism  between  Sub- 
stance and  Person,  and  does  not  give  its  process. 
Spinoza  took  up  the  doctrine  of  Substance,  which 
he  received  through  Descartes  from  Scholasticism, 
and  developed  it  so  prodigiously  that  it  swallowed 
not  only  the  Trinity  as  such,  but  God  himself. 
Spinoza,  who  was  a  Jew  and  had  in  his  spirit  a 
decided  Jewish  and  hence  anti-trinitarian  element 
in  spite  of  his  separation  from  the  synagogue, 
simply  unfolded  to  its  negative  outcome  this  defi- 
nition of  the  Trinity;  after  him  it  was  no  longer 
possible,  but  a  new  conception  of  the  Trinity  had 
to  be  formed  and  to  be  developed,  for  Spinoza 
did  not  destroy  it,  but  compelled  its  supporters 
to  open  up  its  deeper  foundation  both  in  the  soul 
of  man  and  in  the  spirit  of  the  ages.  In  general 
the  theologians  and  also  the  philosophers  of  re- 
cent times  have  recognized  and  set  forth  the  pro- 
found and  universal  significance  of  the  Trinity. 

This  doctrine  has  a  most  instructive  and  far- 
reaching  history.     In  Asia,  the  home  of  religions, 


382  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

it  is  found  in  many  forms.  The  earlv  Hindoo 
has  what  is  sometimes  called  the  Vedic  Triad  — 
Agni,  Indra,  Surga;  Brahmanism  has  the  three 
great  gods  also  in  a  Triad  —  Brahma,  Vishnu, 
Siva;  finally  the  Trimurti,  or  the  three-formed 
one  has  been  often  named  by  Occidental  writers 
the  Hindoo  Trinity.  The  religion  of  India  has  a 
vague  Trinitarian  fermentation  going  through  it 
from  beginning  to  end,  with  many  divine  incar- 
nations, and  fantastic  gleams  of  future  religions. 
Ancient  Egypt  had  also  its  Trinity — Osiris,  Isis, 
and  Horus,  with  numerous  surprising  analogies 
to  the  story  of  Christ,  as  divine  sonship,  death 
of  the  God,  and  His  resurection.  Western  Asia 
at  the  birth  of  Christ  was  a  seething  cauldron  of 
all  Oriental  religions,  which  were  seeking  to 
shape  themselves  into  some  universal  form  corre- 
sponding to  the  universal  empire  of  Rome. 

The  threefold  divinity  could  not  be  expressed 
very  well  in  Greek  Sculpture  without  a  commin- 
gling of  shapes  horrible  to  the  Greek  artistic 
sense.  Still  this  idea  found  utterance  in  the  pure 
forms  of  Greek  philosophy,  though  by  no  means 
with  completeness.  Plato  has  his  well-known  tri- 
chotomy or  threefold  division  of  spirit,  and  the 
same  occurs  frequently  in  Aristotle.  The  dom- 
inating power  of  the  Trinity  in  the  Middle  Ages 
ruled  in  Theology  and  Philosophy ;  also  it  organ- 
ized the  greatest  medieval  poem,  Dante's  Divine 
Comedv,  which  is  triune,  both  in  its  totalitv  and 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION^.  383 

in  its  details,  even  in  its  versification.  Into  the 
proverbs  of  the  people  the  same  thought  has  pen- 
etrated .  The  mightiest  modern  philosophers  show 
its  influence,  Kant  has  it  and  Hegel  makes  it  the 
ground-work  of  his  system  of  philosophy ;  in 
fact  the  last  great  movement  of  European  thought, 
that  from  Ivant  to  Hegel,  may  be  regarded  as  a 
new  explication  of  the  Trinity  both  in  its  form 
and  in  its  content.  Especially  Hegel  and  his  dis- 
ciples make  the  philosophical  Logos,  which  is 
unfolded  in  the  Hegelian  Logic,  threefold  in  its 
own  movement  and  in  all  applications,  in  Art, 
History,  Religion,  and  even  in  Nature. 

Thus  the  Trinity  has  b}'^  no  means  lost  its  hold 
upon  mankind,  but  it  has  vastly  extended  its 
domain ;  we  may  consider  it  to  have  developed 
beyond  Religion,  and  to  have  become  secularized, 
having  shown  itself  as  the  creative  principle  of 
secular  disciplines.  In  this  form  it  is  no  longer 
called  the  Trinity  or  thought  of  as  such  ;  it  drops 
its  religious  name  and  receives  a  philosophical 
designation.  Still  it  is  deeply  working  in  all 
modern  thought,  and  reveals  itself  as  the  inner- 
most genetic  principle  of  the  secular  philosophy 
of  the  present  century,  which,  though  largely 
casting  off  the  scholastic  forms,  has  inherited 
and  is  still  evolving  the  substance  of  scholas- 
ticism. 

But  Philosophy  in  its  development  is  also 
revealing    its    limitation.     It  makes   the    triune 


384  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

formulation  abstract,  impersonal,  unreal,  by  di- 
vorcing the  same  from  the  Ego  which  is  its  foun- 
tain-head. The  next  great  explication  of  the 
triune  Spirit,  which  has  passed  through  its  prim- 
itive, its  scholastic,  and  its  philosophical  stages, 
must  be  psychological,  not  metaphysical;  it  must 
pass  from  abstract  concepts  hanging  in  the  air  to 
the  living  utterance  of  the  movement  of  the  Eg-o 
itself,  which  is  the  universal  Psychosis.  The 
religious  conception  of  God  as  the  absolute  Person 
has,  of  its  own  inner  necessity,  the  threefold 
movement  which  is  stated  in  the  Trinity,  but 
which,  as  personal.  Philosophy  has  quite  obscured 
if  not  obliterated.  This  was  the  essential  diffi- 
culty likewise  with  Greek  Philosophy  in  spite. of 
its  great  services  to  human  culture.  The  abstract 
universal  of  Greek  thought  had  to  be  made  per- 
sonal by  Christ  else  it  had  certainly  perished. 
In  like  manner  the  abstract  concept  (^Begriff)  of 
Hegel  with  its  abstract  triad  of  universality,  par- 
ticularity, and  individuality  must  be  re-baptized 
in  the  Ego  whence  it  orioinallv  came,  as  Heo;el 
himself  knows  and  says,  but  from  which  it  has 
become  quite  separated  and  estranged.  That  is. 
Philosophy  must  now  be,  in  the  highest  sense  of 
the  term,  psychologized. 

Thus  what  we  have  called  the  Theogonic  Pro- 
cess of  the  Religious  Institution  has  unfolded  it- 
self into  its  highest  manifestation  in  the  Christian 
Trinity  —  Father,   Son,    and   Holy   Ghost.     As 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  885 

this  Trinity  first  appeared  in  Time,  so  it  has  con- 
tinued to  unfold  through  Time,  down  to  the  pres- 
ent. The  absolute  Person  in  his  process  with 
Himself  it  is,  or  the  Divine  Psychosis  revealed ; 
not  simply  God  but  the  selfhood  of  God  with  its 
inner  movement  made  manifest  to  the  w^orld,  or 
oiitered;  such  is  the  principle  of  Revealed  Re- 
ligion. 

And  now  this  inner  movement  of  the  absolute 
Ego  is  not  only  to  show  itself  to  the  world,  but 
also  is  to  show  itself  to  be  the  world  or  the  creat- 
ive principle  of  the  universe.  God  as  self- 
creative  and  also  as  revealing  his  self -creative 
process,  is  theogonic;  but  now  that  creative 
energy  must  show  itself  in  what  it  creates,  in  the 
creation  proper,  which  will  again  reveal  the  abso- 
lute Ego  which  created  it.  The  world,  the  cos- 
mos will  thus  manifest  a  new  form  or  stage  of 
the  Divine  Psychosis,  which  has  expressed  itself 
in  the  Religious  Institution  through  all  ages. 

II.  The  Cosmogonic  Process.  The  absolute 
Ego  as  self -creative  creates  that  which  is  not 
Self,  else  it  were  not  absolute.  The  primal 
characteristic  of  the  external  world  is  just  this 
not-Self  (non-Ego);  my  first  affirmation  con- 
cerning the  physical  universe  is  that  it  is  not 
myself,  is  something  outside  of  me,  and  of  all 
like  me ;  it  is  not  Self  but  the  opposite  of  Self. 
Such  is  the  complete  separation  and  difference 
of   the   divine   Ego    from   its  own   inner   Self 

25 


386  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

namely,  the  outer  negation  of  this  inter nality, 
which  is  manifested  in  the  world,  the  latter  for 
this  reason  being  deemed  hostile  to  God. 

And  yet  just  this  world  is  God's  creation,  is 
the  product  and  manifestation  of  his  creative  Ego. 
He,  the  infinite,  cannot  have  the  finite  outside  of 
Himself,  else  He  were  not  the  infinite.  Thus  the 
finite  is  a  part  or  phase  of  the  infinite  process  of 
the  Ego.  He,  the  most  perfect  being,  has  within 
his  creative  act  the  imperfect,  whose  process  unto 
perfection  He  is.  The  perfect  being  is  not  some- 
thing fixed,  attained,  else  it  could  stand  in  no 
relation  to  the  imperfect,  and  thereby  would  be 
itself  imperfect,  having  no  creative  power.  God 
as  unproductive  is  not  God.  Still  He  puts  him- 
self into  the  imperfect,  which  is  thereby  in  an 
eternal  process  with  Him,  the  perfect;  in  other 
words  He  gives  to  the  imperfect  not  perfection 
but  perfectibility,  Himself  not  as  reahzed  but  as 
an  ideal  to  be  striven  for ;  hence  we  may  put  it, 
God  the  ideally  perfect  has  created  the  imperfect 
perfectible.  Such  seems  to  be  the  meaning  of 
the  text :  Be  ye  perfect  as  your  Father  in  Heaven 
is  perfect. 

Thus  the  world  has  in  it  the  dualism ;  the  finite, 
yet  with  an  infinite  end ;  the  imperfect,  yet  with 
the  ideal  of  perfection;  God's  opposite  which  is 
to  become  God's  own;  the  divine  non-Ego  which 
has  yet  in  it  the  process  of  the  divine  Ego. 
Hence  the  religious  consciousness  puts  into  the 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  "'87 

world  the  element  of  evil,  which  is  the  opposite 
of  the  Divine  Ego,  yet  which  has  in  it  the  pro- 
cess which  is  the  undoing  of  evil  and  the  return 
to  God. 

The  Cosmogonic  Process  shows  three  main 
stages  which  are  distinct  3'et  belong  together  in 
one  great  movement.  The  first  is  Nature,  the 
material  or  visible  world,  the  outermost  appear- 
ance of  creation;  the  second  is  Man,  who  has  a 
dual  character,  belonging  to  Nature  on  the  one 
side  and  to  Spirit  on  the  other ;  the  third  is  the 
spiritual  realm  in  which  Man  lives,  namely  In- 
stitutions, here  the  primal  Institution. 

In  all  religions  there  is  a  cosmogonic  period 
when  God  is  specially  conceived  as  the  world- 
creator.  Something  of  this  tendency  lies  in  the 
earliest  beliefs,  and  it  never  quite  vanishes  out  of 
the  most  developed  creeds.  It  may  be  here  men- 
tioned that  the  Old  Testament  has  given  to  Chris- 
tendom a  Cosmogony,  and  the  New  Testament  a 
Theogony.  The  beginning  of  the  Hebrew  Bible 
takes  God  for  granted,  and  then  shows  Him  cre- 
ating the  w^orld  along  with  man.  But  the  Gos- 
pels declare  a  new  Divine  Genesis  in  the  Son  and 
in  the  Trinity,  and  thus  go  back  and  unfold  the 
implicit  Divine  Person  with  whom  the  Hebrew 
Cosmogony  begins. 

1.  Nature.  The  word  implies  that  which  is 
born  or  created.  It  is  the  opposite  pole  of  the 
absolute  Ego,  dts  extreme  outsideness,  and  there- 


388  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

fore  visible  to  the  senses.  Nature  is,  in  general, 
the  sensible  world;  Nature  sensed  is  God's  out- 
side taken  up  by  Man's  outside  and  made  interna!. 
Nature,  being  external  to  God,  is  external  to 
itself;  it  is  forever  throwing  itself  out  of 
itself,  manifesting  itself,  appearing,  emanating 
without  any  complete  return.  Separated  from 
the  absolute  Self,  it  is  separated  from  itself 
absolutely ;  ejected  from  the  creative  center  of 
the  universe,  it  cannot  have  any  center  of  its 
own,  but  is  forever  repeating  its  self-separation. 
A  piece  of  matter  has  gravitation  and  is  forever 
seekino-  a  center  which  it  cannot  reach  without 
ceasing  to  be  material. 

On  the  other  hand  Nature  is  the  creation  of 
the  absolute  Ego,  and  must  show  the  hitter's 
process.  It  is  God's  opposite  and  still  is  God's. 
Such  is  its  dualism  or  duplicity,  if  you  please; 
though  it  be  the  Divine  Person  turned  inside  out, 
it  is  still  divine.  Hence  the  two  opposite  predi- 
cates which  have  been  and  may  be  attached  to 
Nature;  it  is  both  good  and  evil.  "  And  God 
saw  that  it  was  good."  Still  on  the  other  hand 
we  read  of  "  the  world,  the  flesh  and  the  devil," 
coupled  together  in  condemnation. 

The  Religious  Institution  has  in  some  form  a 
mythical  Cosmogony  which  represents  the  origi- 
nal Person  creating  Nature.  There  is  the  primor- 
dial separation  of  Darkness  and  Light,  of  Night 
and  Day,  with  the  appearance  and  disappearance 


THE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  389 

of  the  Sun.  Then  conies  the  more  desperate 
division,  when  the  cosmical  egg  cracks  open  and 
turns  to  Heaven  with  its  hollow  shell  above  and 
the  full  Earth  below.  Nature  becomes  the 
source  of  the  Mythus  when  it  is  made  to  image 
the  will  of  the  absolute  Ego.  Sometimes  it  is 
not  the  will  but  the  thouoht  of  the  absolute  Eg-o 
which  is  declared  to  be  the  primordial  source  of 
the  universe;  so  in  a  Hindoo  mythus.  The  most 
influential  of  all  these  Cosmoo-onies  has  doubtless 
been  the  Hebrew,  at  least  for  the  Occident.  Yet 
the  Hebrew  account  of  creation  has  been  recently 
traced  to  Babylonian  and  other  sources,  thus 
hinting  the  far-off  evolutions  of  religion,  even  of 
our  own. 

Here  we  may  note  the  new  Cosmogony  intro- 
duced by  science  —  Nature  unfolds  of  herself 
from  lower  to  higher  forms  till  she  evolves  Man. 
Not  now  is  she  directly  produced  by  the  fiat  of  a 
Creator,  but  is  developed,  is  self-produced, 
whereby  she  obtains  a  new  dignity.  This,  how- 
ever, does  not  set  aside  the  divinely  creative  Ego 
as  some  have  supposed. 

2.  Man.  The  creation  of  Man  is  the  secona 
great  fact  of  the  Cosmogonic  Process.  The  Di- 
vine Will  creates  another  Will  whose  essence  is 
creative ;  the  absolute  originative  Power  not  only 
produces  something  but  reproduces  itself  as  orig- 
inative; thus  Man  is  the  created,  but  also  the 
creative,  yea  the  self-creative.     He  is  Ego  and  its 


390  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

process,  having  the  divine  Psychosis  within  him- 
self, yet  derived;  he  is  brought  forth,  yet  his 
destiny  is  to  bring  forth  himself.  Thus  he  has 
a  doable  element :  that  of  Nature  and  that  of 
Spirit ;  he  is  the  necessitated  which  is  to  make 
itself  free,  he  is  created  by  God  that  he  may  re- 
create himself  and  thus  be  also  a  creator.  His 
likeness  to  his  Divine  Maker  lies  in  his  creativity. 
The  question  has  often  been  asked,  Why  did 
God  create  man?  He  had  to  do  ju^t  that  su- 
preme act  in  order  to  be  Himself,  to  be  absolute 
Free-Will  whose  essence  is  to  will  itself,  namely 
Free-Will.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  God 
made  man  in  order  to  be  free,  He  had  to  make  a 
free  being  in  order  to  be  fully  free  Himself,  that  is, 
actually  free,  objectively  free.  The  creation  of 
Man  by  God  was  not  an  act  of  caprice,  but  of  ra- 
tional freedom,  which  always  wills  the  existence 
of  Free-Will.  Man  is  as  necessary  to  God,  as 
God  is  to  Man,  whose  destiny  is  also  a  rational 
freedom.  Man  has  a  capricious  God  as  long  as 
he  is  himself  capricious,  or  potentially  free,  not 
actually.  Man  may  indeed  be  made  "  to  glorify 
God,"  but  his  greatest  glorification  of  God  is  to 
actualize  freedom  in  himself  and  in  the  world. 
Then  God  also  can  be  free,  free  actually,  can 
Avill  a  Free-Will.  Then  He  has  a  true  companion 
in  Man,  and  we  can  understand  that  He  made 
Man  in  order  not  to  be  alone  in  this  big  Universe, 
in   order  to    have    some  congenial   friends,  who 


a  ^  > 


THE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  391 

may    do  not  only  His  Will,  but   whose  "Will  He 
may  do  without  self-stultification. 

The  Relio-ious  Institution  will  have  to  the  last 
the  Creation  of  Man  by  God  as  a  part  of  its 
Cosmogony,  which,  however,  will  show  many 
stages  of  development.  A  naive  but  deeply  sig- 
nificant account  of  it  is  the  one  contained  in  the 
Hebrew  Bible.  Created  Man  is  placed  in  Eden 
first,  where  is  the  state  of  innocence;  then  fol- 
lows the  fall,  the  grand  separation  and  estrange- 
ment, with  banishment  from  Edenint(j  the  world ; 
finally  comes  the  return  to  paradise  through 
the  world.  This  gives  the  fundamental  process 
of  Man  in  all  simplicity  and  transparency,  the 
inherent  threefold  movement  of  his  soul  in  its 
journey  through  Creation.  It  is  the  most  im- 
portant and  suggestive  Mythus  ever  conceived; 
notonly  theMj^thusof  Creation,  but  itself  creative 
above  any  other  Mythus  or  utterance  of  human 
speech.  It  has  given  birth  to  a  vast  literature  — 
legends,  poems,  dramas,  and  their  counterparts 
also,  sermons  and  theologies;  it  has  called  forth 
many  forms  of  art  in  sculpture  and  painting,  and 
it  has  likewise  been  set  to  music.  The  most 
famous  offspring  of  the  story  of  Paradise  in 
English  is  Milton's  poem.  But  the  greatest 
reconstruction  of  this  grand  Cosmogonic  Tale  of 
Man  is  found  in  Dante's  Divine  Comedy,  in  which 
the  fallen  one  is  not  Adam,  the  first  man,  but  just 
tlie  speaker  himself,  this  Dante,  and  indeed  every 


892  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

person.  Dante  places  much  stress  upon  the  fall, 
but  still  more  upon  the  rise  and  return  to  Para- 
dise, which  with  him  is  the  return  to  the  very 
presence  of  God. 

Thus  the  absolute  Es;o  has  created  another  Ego 
opposite  to  Himself,  and  yet  Himself  likewise, 
separated  yet  returning  to  the  divine  fountain- 
head.  It  is  a  finite  consciousness  whose  deepest 
attribute  and  aspiration  is  the  God-consciousness, 
into  which  man  is  forever  moving,  even  when  un- 
aware of  it,  even  when  he  denies  it,  making  him- 
self a  Mephistopheles,  "  the  spirit  that  denies." 

Let  us  note  this  movement.  (1)  The  indi- 
vidual acting  finds  a  world  of  objects  in  oppo- 
sition, which  world  has  been  already  created  or 
at  least  is  existent.  (2)  This  existent  world 
asserts  itself  against  him,  it  has  too  a  Will  of  its 
own.  Such  is  the  primary  stage  of  conflict  be- 
tween subject  and  object,  between  the  individual 
Ego  and  external  Nature.  Thus  the  two  prod- 
ucts of  divine  Creation  are  born,  as  it  were,  in  a 
struoo-le  with  each  other.  The  Cosmoo-ouic 
Process  has  begotten  Nature  and  Man,  but  be- 
gotten them  fighting.  (3)  The  Ego  recognizes 
the  "Will  in  Nature.  My  individual  Will  colliding 
with  the  existent  world  finds  its  Will,  which  is 
very  different  from  my  own,  being  all-powerful, 
yet  is  a  AVill  manifesting  itself.  Thus  Man  rises 
through  Nature,  up  to  Nature's  God  as  the  nec- 
essary presupposition  of  himself  and  the  world. 


THE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  393 

The  primitive  Man  in  his  terror  at  the  storm 
beholds  in  its  power  and  activity  the  work  of  a 
Will,  which  functions  like  his  own,  yet  is  far 
mightier,  indeed  almighty.  Moreover  that  Will, 
being  like  his  own,  he  must  conciliate,  recognize, 
harmonize  with  himself  through  offerings,  and 
worship,  and  penance.  Therein  he  makes  the 
Supreme  Will  placable,  it  can  be  conciliated. 
But  he  too  must  in  the  same  act  become  placable, 
he  wills  to  assimilate  himself  to  his  Gods,  and  is 
on  the  road  to  mercy,  both  in  demanding  and 
granting  placability. 

Thus  religion  is  the  great  trainer  of  humanity 
to  humanity.  Before  his  Gods,  though  they  be 
of  the  crudest,  he  begins  to  give  up  his  natural 
impulse;  if  he  can  conciliate  them,  he  too  must 
be  capable  of  conciliation.  The  absolute  Will  of 
the  World  which  utters  itself  in  the  mighty  evo- 
lutions and  also  in  the  catastrophies  of  Nature  is 
not  limited  like  the  individual  Will  of  Man,  yet 
both  have  fundamentally  one  and  the  same  pro- 
cess, that  of  the  Ego,  and  both  can  come  to- 
gether in  recognition.  When  man  conceives  the 
Gods  to  be  placable,  he  must  become  so  himself, 
placable  to  his  brother,  and  so  humanity  starts 
with  religion.  This  thought  the  speech  of  Phoe- 
nix in  the  ninth  book  of  the  Iliad  has  made  the 
imperishable  spiritual  possession  of  the  Occident. 
He  is  trying  to  persuade  Achilles  to  cease  from 
wrath   and  be  reconciled  with  the  Greeks,  when 


394  SOCIAL   INSTITUTIONS. 

he  breaks  out  with  the  supreme  argument,  saying : 
"The  Gods  are  placable."  So  you  (Achilles) 
must  be  placable  to  us  (the  Greeks)  who  are 
seeking  to  appease  you  ;  what  you  demand  of  the 
Gods  for  yourself,  you  cannot  refuse  to  us  with- 
out incurring  their  retribution. 

The  God-consciousness  is  from  its  dawning 
touched  with  compassion ;  the  bloodiest  rites  of 
the  savage  are  usually  for  the  purpose  of  concili- 
atinof  the  deitv.  Even  Moloch  smeared  with 
gore  must  have  been  deemed  placable  by  his 
worshipers,  and  thus  has  a  strain  in  him  which 
will  develop  into  a  higher  worship.  Some  inves- 
tigators have  traced  the  Hebrew  Jahveh  to  the 
terrible  God  of  the  desert,  who  destroys  in  his 
wrath,  but  who  may  also  save  in  his  mercy  if  due 
offerings  be  made.  Then  followed  Baal,  the 
deity  of  agriculture  in  the  land  flowing  with  milk- 
honey,  and  from  a  tribal  he  rose  to  being  a 
national  God.  It  is  declared  by  some  that  the 
Prophets  are  the  real  authors  of  Hebrew  Mono- 
theism, at  least  in  its  complete  development. 
Whatever  be  the  historic  stages,  it  would  seem 
that  Jahveh  shadows  forth  the  phases  of  the  un- 
folding of  the  Hebrew  God-consciousness,  which 
has  proved  itself  more  strongly  monotheistic  than 
that  of  any  other  race.  The  discipline  of  the 
Hebrews  as  recorded  in  the  book  of  their  wander- 
ings, backsUdings  and  recoveries  of  many  kinds, 
is;  to  bring  them  to  will  the  A^lll  of  their  God, 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  396 

who  is  the  one  God,  at  first  over  the  family  and 
tribe,  then  over  the  nation,  then  over  all  mankind, 
in  which  last  case  He  is  risen  to  universality. 

But  in  order  to  have  all  the  members  of  the 
domestic  or  tribal  oroanization  will  the  Will  of 
the  God,  there  must  be  an  Institution  for  just 
this  purpose.  It  is,  however,  not  distinct  from 
family  and  tribe,  but  one  with  them  in  its  prim- 
itive form,  and  rises  with  the  dawn  of  self- 
consciousness,  which  also  brings  with  it  the 
God-consciousness.  The  primal  Institution  is 
actualized  Will  whose  function  is  to  affirm,  deter- 
mine, and  make  valid  God's  Will.  This  primal 
Institution  of  man,  as  belonging  to  the  Cosmog- 
onic  Process,  we  might  designate  as  the  cosmical 
Institution  rising  out  of  the  primordial  institu- 
tional chaos,  and  starting  the  ordered  world  of  In- 
stitutions. Like  Nature,  like  Man,  it  is  represen- 
ted as  created  by  God  in  the  beginning.  Man  in 
his  dual  character,  as  both  created  and  creating,  is 
to  will  and  keep  alive  the  divinely  creative  power 
which  is  the  source  of  his  own  existence.  This 
is  done  through  the  Institution,  which  is  thus  a 
second  Nature,  a  new  objective  world,  the  invis- 
ible one,  which  in  all  Cosmogonies  is  the  work  of 
tiie  Creator. 

3.  The  Primal  Institution.  This  is,  accord- 
ingly, the  third  stage  of  the  Cosmogonic  Process, 
or  of  world-creation,  namely  the  creation  of  the 
institutional  world.      It  is   a  return  to  objective 


896  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Nature,  yet  not  now  the  sensible  but  the 
supersensible,  spiritual  one,  in  which  man  is 
to  share  in  the  divinely  creative  Self.  The 
first  Institution  it  is  in  time  as  well  as  in 
thought,  being  the  germ  which  unfolds  into  all 
Institutions,  both  secular  and  religious.  We 
might  call  it  the  Family,  as  it  is  connected  with 
the  union  of  the  sexes ;  still  it  is  the  Family 
undifferentiated,  containing  implicitly  Society, 
State  and  Church.  In  the  Hebrew  Cosmogony 
it  was  God  who  created  not  only  the  first  sexual 
pair,  but  who  also  instituted  the  first  Family  and 
put  it  into  its  first  Home,  which  was  likewise  his 
work.  In  the  Greek  Pantheon  the  Gods  them- 
selves are  arranged  in  Families,  while  Christen- 
dom is  based  upon  the  one  Divdue  Family. 

The  Family  is  the  generative  Institution  both 
of  Men  and  of  Gods,  being  the  supreme  bearer 
of  the  divine  principle,  creativity.  The  repro- 
duction of  the  Person  has  been  previously  said  to 
be  the  great  end  of  the  Family,  Avhich  thus  pre- 
serves the  primal  creative  act  of  God  himself  in 
the  creation  of  man. 

It  may  be  said  that  ties  of  Family  are  far 
closer,  far  more  religious  amongf  the  less  ad- 
vanced  peoples  than  among  the  more  civilized. 
The  tie  of  blood  is  considered  not  so  much  a  hu- 
man as  a  divine  bond,  entailing  sacred  duties, 
among  others  formerly  that  of  revenge  for  the 
death  of  kindred. 


THE  UELIOIOV^  INSTITUTION.  397 

The  primordial  Institution  with  its  worship  and 
its  duties  begins  to  establish  a  new  world  over 
Nature,  or  w^hat  we  have  called  a  second  Nature, 
which  unites  man  perpetually  with  his  divine 
source.  It  overcanopies  him  like  Nature,  yet 
with  an  invisible  Heaven  of  spirits.  It  takes  him 
out  of  his  merely  phj^sicial  existence  and  starts 
his  institutional  life,  which  co-exists  with  the 
very  origin  of  the  Self. 

We  shall  often  have  occasion  to  refer  to  this 
first  Institution  as  the  germ  or  genetic  starting- 
point  of  all  other  Institutions.  Psychically  it 
springs  from  the  originative  power  of  Will  itself, 
which  by  its  own  inherent  logic  becomes  actual- 
ized Will ;  but  from  the  cosmogonic  point  of 
view  it  is  a  creation  of  God,  who  together  with 
Nature  and  Man,  creates  this  institutional  germ, 
which  it  is  to  unfold  along  with  the  human  being 
into  all  civilization. 

This  Cosmogonic  Institution  begins  early  to 
differentiate  itself  into  forms  more  and  more 
independent.  We  shall  find  that  such  separation 
is  accompanied  by  a  separation  of  deities  in  cor- 
respondence to  the  unfolding  of  Institutions. 
The  mentioned  first  Institution  contains  implic- 
itly the  following  Institutions  with  their  deities. 

(1)  Each  family  has  its  own  God  peculiar  to 
it  (Penates).  Also  there  is  the  Goddess  of  the 
hearth  (Hestia).  Each  family  thus  has  its  own 
distinct  religion  up  to  a  certain   point.     Every 


398  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

member  of  it  must  subject  his  Will  to  the  domes- 
tic deity  tirst  of  all. 

(2)  The  tribal  deities  come  next  in  order, 
inasmuch  as  we  find  a  new  set  of  Gods  presiding 
over  social  totalities  greater  than  the  Family, 
such  as  the  tribe,  the  phratry,  the  gens,  clan, 
etc.  Here  we  may  note  a  new  subordination  of 
the  Will  for  social  ends,  which  is  accomplished 
throuoh  reliofion.  Into  every  form  and  grade  of 
human  association  the  religious  Institution  enters 
as  the  fundamental  fact. 

(3)  The  God  of  the  State  is  usually  the  su- 
preme one,  Zeus,  Jupiter,  Jahveh,  represent- 
ing the  oneness  and  authority  of  the  folk  or  of 
the  nation,  perchance  of  the  race.  Among  pol}'- 
theistic  peo[)les  the  political  God  is  the  ruler  of 
the  Pantheon  and  shows  the  monotheistic  process 
going  on  among  the  multiplicity  of  deities,  as  in 
Homer. 

Thus  Family,  Society,  and  State  will  have  their 
distinct  Gods  in  the  early  stage  of  institutional 
development.  It  seems  to  have  been  the  Greco- 
Roman  civilization  which  first  completely  sepa- 
rated the  various  Institutions  from  the  primal 
Cosmogonic  Institution,  and  transmitted  them  in 
the  differentiated  condition  in  which  we  now  have 
them.  Especially  the  secular  Institution  became 
divided  from  the  religious  Institution  in  classical 
antiquity,  whose  culture  quite  threw  away  all 
faith    in  the  latter.     But  Christianit}'  gradually 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  '^99 

took  the  place  of  it,  and  the  religious  Institution 
rose  again  with  new  power  in  the  Church. 

It  may  well  be  affirmed  that  if  the  Church  had 
not  restored  the  God-consciousness  to  man,  the 
secular  civilization  of  antiquity  would  have  been 
lost  through  its  own  self -negation.  The  grand 
function  of  the  religious  Institution  is  to  keep 
the  human  soul  up  to  the  high-water  mark  of 
institutional  development,  and  not  let  it  fall  back 
into  lower  stages  already  transcended.  Reversion 
is  against  God's  Will,  particularly  institutional 
reversion,  which  can  only  mean  spiritual  deca- 
dence. Sin  is  a  going  back  to  a  pre-existent 
lower  condition  of  j^our  race,  it  is  a  giving  up  of 
your  inheritance  of  progress  and  a  denial  of  your 
own  limit-transcending  selfhood.  As  man  ad- 
vances into  a  deeper  consciousness  of  his  own 
freedom  as  institutional,  so  he  must  move  for- 
ward in  his  consciousness  of  God  as  a  Free  Will 
whose  supreme  end  is  to  make  itself  actual  and 
universal. 

Herewith  we  bring  to  an  end  the  Cosmogonic 
Process,  or  God  creating  the  cosmos  of  Nature, 
Man,  and  the  Institution,  which  is  a  more  or  less 
emphatic  element  in  every  religion.  Its  main 
fact  is  the  separation  into  the  Creator  and  the 
Created;  the  latter  culminates  in  a  Self,  Man, 
who  is  created  creative  by  his  Creator,  and  who 
is  to  reproduce  in  himself  the  divine  Process  of 
the  Self,  thus  making-  himself  one  with  God. 


400  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

This  Process  has  been  already  given,  and  named 
the  Theogonic  Process  —  the  Father,  the  Son, 
and  the  Holy  Spirit  —  which  the  created  Self, 
the  Man,  is  now  to  take  up  and  recreate  within 
himself,  thereby  making  his  own  the  innermost 
Process  of  the  divine  Self. 

But  such  a  Process  can  be  performed,  pre- 
served and  transmitted  only  by  an  Institution, 
which  has  thi^  as  its  content  and  end.  Hence 
God  creates  the  Holy  Institution,  or,  as  Chris- 
tians say,  He  creates  His  Church,  to  keep  alive 
and  active  His  divine  Process,  or  the  God-con- 
sciousness, among  men.  Such  is  the  third  stage 
of  the  Positive  Religious  Institution,  in  which 
this  really  first  appears  as  an  Institution  in  the 
world  with  its  external  forms  and  dog-mas.  This 
we  hav^e  named  the  Hierogonic  Process,  or  the 
Creation  of  the  Sanctuary.  Already  we  have 
seen  the  primal  Institution  appear  in  the  Cos- 
mogonic  Process ;  but  now  we  are  to  see  the  In- 
stitution which  underlies  all  others  as  it  contains 
the  very  Process  of  the  Creator  Himself. 

HI.  The  HierogoxicPkocess.  This  is,  then, 
the  third  stage  of  the  Positive  Religious  Institu- 
tion, which  has  now  become  explicit  as  an  Insti- 
tution. It  has  shown  the  main  factors,  Man  and 
God,  in  a  state  of  separation,  which,  however,  is 
to  be  overcome  in  the  present  sphere.  In  gen- 
eral, the  finite,  erring,  sinful  Ego  is  to  be  re- 
stored to    and  united  with  the  absolute  Person 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  401 

through  what  we  here  call  the  Hierogonic  Pro- 
cess, Avhich  is  the  function  of  the  Holy  Institu- 
tion (Ilieron). 

This  Institution  exists  in  the  world,  is  actual- 
ized Will  whose  end  is  to  bring  Man's  Will  into 
harmony  with  God's  Will.  For  the  individual 
attains  his  hiohest  freedom  throug-h  willing;  the 
Divine  Will  and  keeping  the  same  eternally  alive 
and  active  in  his  soul. 

The  Hierogonic  Process  realizes  itself  in  wor- 
ship, rites,  observances,  creed,  Bible,  etc.  The 
individual  Ego  employs  all  these  as  a  means  for 
communion  with  the  absolute  Person,  whose 
essence  has  been  already  given  in  the  Theogonic 
Process.  Thus  man  re-creates  within  himself 
God's  own  creation,  the  divine  Process  itself, 
which  is  to  be  the  deepest  fact  of  his  life. 

Hence  this  third  stag-e  is  a  return  to  the  first 
(the  Theogonic)  which  supplies  its  content,  gives 
to  the  outer  organization  of  religion  its  inner- 
most  essence,  namely,  God.  The  Hierogonic 
Process  is  realized  in  the  Church  or  the  Religious 
Institution,  but  its  counterpart  is  in  the  human 
soul,  which  is  to  make  the  Divine  Process  its 
own,  to  appropriate  God. 

In  the  present  sphere,  then,  we  make  the  in- 
ternal process  of  the  absolute  Self  actual,  insti- 
tutional, indeed  external  and  working  in  the 
world.  He  no  longer  keeps  to  Himself,  per- 
chance contemplating  His  own  divine  perfection, 

2G 


402  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

which,  if  He  did,  He  would  certainly  be  imper- 
fect. As  Theogonic,  God  is  all  to  Himself,  but 
as  Hierogonic,  He  is  all  for  man,  and  man  is  all 
for  Him,  or  is  to  become  so.  The  Institution  is 
what  actualizes  God,  and  brings  Him  out  of  His 
own  inner  Self's  Process  into  participation  with 
the  human  Self. 

This  actualizing  of  God  in  Man,  which  brings 
the  Divine  Psychosis  into  the  finite  Ego  through 
the  Institution,  has  three  stages,  which  we  shall 
name  Worship,  Doctrine,  Priesthood — the  three 
together  revealing  what  was  above  designated  as 
the  Hierogonic  Process. 

1 .  Worship.  In  this  term  is  expressed  the 
immediate  relation  of  the  human  to  the  Divine 
Ego.  The  humblest  savao^e  has  some  form  of 
Worship,  quite  in  proportion  to  his  mental  con- 
dition. Man  as  an  Ego  has  to  project  an  Ego  as 
the  center  of  things  and  events,  who  is  his  uni- 
versal counterpart,  and  to  whom  he  relates  him- 
self directly.  This  primary  psychical  relation 
between  a  finite  and  infinite  Person  is  Faith,  Faith 
in  God. 

Moreover  the  individual  Will  is  to  place  itself 
in  unity  with  this  absolute  Will,  must  conciliate 
it  through  prayer,  offerings,  ceremonies.  The 
basic  fact  here  is  that  the  human  Will  is  to  sub- 
mit itself  to  the  Divine  Will,  and  calls  into  activity 
an  Institution,  through  which  man  can  establish, 
preserve  and  transmit  his  unity  with  God. 


THE  EELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  408 

Thus  among  all  peoples  a  more  or  less  compli- 
cated, religious  ceremonial  comes  into  existence, 
into  which  the  individual  is  placed  and  is  thereby 
made  to  live  in  the  divine  order. 

The  act  of  worship  is  the  act  of  service  to  the 
absolute  Person  on  the  part  of  the  finite  individ- 
ual, who  before  all  things  is  to  recog-nize  the  in- 
finite  Ego  and  to  will  its  Will  as  his  own. 

2.  Doctrine.  Worship  is  the  direct  act  of  the 
believer  in  bringing  himself  into  unity  with  God. 
He  participates  with  his  Will,  he  enacts  his  Faith 
through  prayer,  rites,  sacrifice.  Such  is  the 
primary  form  of  the  Religious  Institution. 

But  now  beo^ins  a  second  staoje ;  the  believer 
turns  from  the  Will  to  the  Intellect,  from  action 
to  contemplation,  from  the  ritual  to  the  meaning 
of  the  ritual.  His  w^hole  inner  world  becomes 
engao-ed  in  the  Hierosjonic  Process.  Imagination, 
Thought,  Reason  begin  working  and  construct- 
ing  their  part  of  the  Religious  Institution.  The 
Faith  underlying  Worship  comes  to  expression 
in  Doctrine,  which  may  include  creed,  dogma, 
story,  mythus,  art  of  various  kinds,  and  a  Bible 
or  Holy  Book. 

This  second  stage  is  man's  attempt  to  formu- 
late for  his  inward  self-conscious  spirit  what 
in  worship  he  has  performed  in  outward  cere- 
mony. The  human  Ego  seeks  an  internal  ex- 
pression of  the  Divine  Ego,  as  more  adequate  to 
itself.     Really  this  is  a  search  for  freedom  when 


404  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  ritual  begins  to  become  oppressive,  or  no 
longer  calls  forth  the  immediate  unquestioning 
Faith  of  the  former  stage.  But  herein  the  Re- 
ligious  Institution  does  not  and  cannot  leave  him 
wholly  to  himself. 

3.  Priestliood.  The  Religious  Institution,  like 
other  Institutions,  has  to  have  an  administrator, 
whom  Ave  may  in  general  call  the  Priest.  It  is 
the  priestly  Person  who  conducts  A^orship,  being 
in  himself  an  ever-present  Worship.  It  may  be 
said  that  the  true  Priest  has  transformed  his  own 
Self  into  a  continuous  unity  with  the  movement 
of  the  Divine  Ego,  so  that  his  consciousness  is 
spontaneously  one  with  the  God-consciousness. 
Thus  by  his  own  act  of  "Worship  he  mediates 
with  the  deity  the  worshiping  people,  who  have 
been  separated  by  their  secular  occupations  from 
communion  with  the  Divine  Self,  with  which  his 
connection  is  never  broken.  For  his  occupation 
is  not  secular  but  religious,  it  is  just  his  function 
to  rouse  and  to  keep  active  the  God-conscious- 
ness in  himself  primarily,  and  then  in  the  con- 
gregation.  . 

Hence  we  may  consider  the  Priest  as  the  never- 
ceasing  return  to  Worship,  which  is  perpetually 
going  on  within  him  in  one  way  or  other.  He 
publicly  performs  Divine  Service,  he  worships  in 
the  presence  of  the  people  who  are  thereby  led 
to  worship  also.  Through  his  mediation  he  is 
to  bring  the  congregation  into  immediate  rela- 


THE  BELIGIOUa  INSTITUTION.  405 

tion  to  God,  he  is  to  evoke  in  till  persons  the 
very  process  of  the  absolute  Person  as  the  Creator 
of  the  Universe. 

The  Priest  may  be  deemed  the  re-incarnation 
of  the  Theogonic  Process,  which,  however,  he 
must  impart  not  as  his  own  specially,  but  as  be- 
longing to  every  human  Ego.  In  this  sense,  too, 
we  may  deem  him  a  consecrated  man,  for  such 
he  ought  to  be.  He  must  have  both  Faith  and 
Doctrine,  the  immediate  and  the  mediated 
(through  Intellect)  stages  of  the  present  Hiero- 
gonic  Process  of  the  Religious  Institution.  That 
is,  he  must  believe  and  know,  and  lead  others  to 
believe  and  know. 

Among  all  peoples,  even  the  lowest,  we  find 
some  form  of  the  priesthood,  which  has  also  had 
its  evolution  in  the  ages.  It  would  not  hurt  the 
Christian  missionary  if  he  could  see  traces  of  his 
primordial  priestly  Self  in  the  mumbo-jumbo 
of  the  African  rain-maker.  Both  are  priests 
of  the  Religious  Institution,  seeking  to  hold 
communion  with  the  divinely  creative  Self,  of 
which,  indeed,  each  has  a  very  different  concep- 
tion. 

The  Priest  has  in  himself  the  double  element, 
whose  inner  o})[)osition  it  is  his  function  to  medi- 
ate, this-worldliness  and  othcr-worldliness.  His 
danger  is  that  he  may  lean  too  nmch  in  one  direc- 
tion or  the  other ;  each  side  produces  an  excess 
which  may  make  him  negative  both  to  his  people 


406  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

aud  to  his  calling.  If  he  is  too  other-worldly, 
he  does  not  fulfil  his  vocation ;  he  is  not  to  with- 
draw into  the  pure  inwardness  of  the  Theogonic 
Process  and  stay  there,  but  is  to  move  forth  and 
to  actualize  that  Process,  imparting  it  to  his  fel- 
low-man through  the  Institution.  On  the  other 
hand,  he  may  be  too  this-worldly,  and  pervert 
his  Institution  to  secular,  even  to  selfish  ends. 
Hence  it  comes  that  with  the  priestl}'^  Ego  a  neg- 
ative element  may  enter  the  institutional  world, 
on  account  of  which  the  priesthood  has  had  its 
share  of  execration  from  the  beginnino^  to  the 
present  time. 

Thus  the  Hierogonic  Process  essentially  com- 
pletes itself  in  Worship  with  its  rites,  in  Doctrine 
with  its  various  forms  of  expression,  and  in  the 
Priest,  the  Self  who  embodies  and  renders  active 
this  Process,  and  the  total  religious  Process. 
Moreover  this  is  the  final  step  which  actualizes 
the  Religious  Institution  as  positive,  whose  three 
main  Processes  have  now  been  set  forth  both  in 
themselves  and  with  one  another. 

Here  it  may  be  stated  that  for  Christendom 
the  J^ew  Testament  has  given  the  Theogonic 
Process,  and  the  Old  Testament  the  Cosniogonic 
Process,  ^vherein  we  observe  that  the  New  goes 
back  and  grounds  the  Old,  showing  its  creative 
pre-supposition.  Both  Testaments,  however, 
give  the  return,  or  phases  of  the  return,  to  God. 
Hence  both  belong  to  the  Hierogonic  Process,  at 


TEE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION;  407 

least  to  the  Christian  one,  which  adopts  them 
both  into  its  Institution,  the  Church. 

The  foregoing  exposition,  accordingly,  sets 
forth  the  inherent  movement  of  the  Relio^ious 
Institution,  showing  its  positive,  constructive 
aspect,  and  unfolding  its  necessary  stages. 
Every  religious  institution  among  men,  even  the 
humblest,  has  some  form  of  the  three  constitutive 
principles,  Theogony,  Cosmogony,  and  Hierog- 
ony,  which  are  likewise  in  a  perpetual  process 
with  one  another.  These  are  the  deepest,  most 
fundamental  content  of  the  folk-lore,  the  myths, 
the  poetry,  the  bibles  of  all  peoples. 

Already  we  have  seen  traces  of  a  negative 
movement  in  the  Religious  Institution,  a  move- 
ment which  is  in  it  and  of  it,  yet  runs  counter  to 
its  essence  and  purpose.  Every  religion  has  in 
its  very  organism  some  shape  of  its  demonic 
antitype,  its  Devil,  who  is  necessarily  a  part  of 
its  total  process.  So  it  comes  that  we  have  to 
reach  below  the  Religious  Institution  as  simply 
positive,  and  to  take  into  the  account  the 
Religious  Institution  as  negative,  which  fact  is 
imaged  in  the  Mythus  as  the  grand  primordial 
battle  in  Heaven  between  God  and  his  would-be 
Destroyer.  Nor  should  we  forget  in  this  con- 
nection, that  to  the  imagination  of  the  author  of 
Job  Satan  also  appears  along  with  the  other 
angels  in  the  presence  of  the  Lord,  and  there 
plays  his  part ;  he  too  belongs  to  the  great  whole, 


408  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

to  the  universal  order.  And  in  any  complete 
exposition  of  the  Religious  Institution,  his  share 
cannot  be  left  out ;  Satan  is  likewise  a  factor  in 
Psychology. 

II.  The  Negative  Religious  Institution. 

The  Religious  Institution  is  to  safeguard  the 
institutional  principle  in  the  secular  world,  keep- 
ing it  eternally  active  in  the  human  Ego,  which 
is  to  will  the  universal  Will  as  Person,  not  as 
Law  or  as  Love,  or  as  the  Law  of  Love,  but  as 
the  absolute  Ego  vrhose  Will  is  ultimately  to 
secure  freedom.  Thus  the  Religious  and  tlie  Sec- 
ular Institutions  have  finally  the  same  function : 
both  are  forms  of  actualized  Will,  whose  end  is 
to  confirm  and  establish  Free-Will  in  the  world. 
The  individual,  in  willing  the  Law  of  the  State, 
is  implicitly  fulfilling  God's  Will,  but  in  the  Re- 
ligious Institution  he  explicitly  does  the  Will  of 
God  as  absolute  Person,  who  is  in  essence  the 
supreme  Law-giver,  whose  Will  is  the  content  and 
genetic  source  of  all  Law.  "  Thy  Will  be  done 
is  the  foundation  of  the  Secular  Institution,  also 
is  the  fountain-head  of  every  institutional  com- 
mand, which,  we  must  always  recollect,  is  given 
for  the  purpose  of  securing  Free-Will.  Thus 
the  Religious  Institution  is  what  creatively  wills 
into  existence  the  Secular  Institution. 

Now  comes  the  other  fact  which  is  the  entering 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  409 

wedge  of  the  negative  element.  The  Rehgious 
Institution  is,  as  we  have  seen,  separate  from  the 
Secular  Institution ;  it  has  a  realm  of  its  own  in 
opposition  to  worldly  affairs,  and  hence  is  liable 
to  become  antagonistic  to  all  other  Institutions. 
But  really  in  such  a  case  it  is  undermining  its 
own  institutional  basis ;  in  destroying  what 
secures  freedom  it  is  destroying  its  own  purpose. 

Thus  the  Religious  Institution  develops  a  most 
emphatic  negative  tendency,  and  when  it  once 
gets  corrupt  and  destructive,  it  seems  to  be  worse 
than  the  depraved  Secular  Institution.  This 
negative  tendency  is  seen  first  in  the  antagonism 
to  the  world  of  Institutions  which  lies  outside  of 
itself;  next,  however,  the  negation  becomes  in- 
ternal, and  the  Religious  Institution  disrupts  it- 
self through  strife  of  sects  and  doctrines ;  finally 
it  reaches  its  complete  self -negation  in  a  denial 
of  the  Absolute  Ego.  It  seems  a  strange  state- 
ment that  the  Religious  Institution  should  organ- 
ize  itself  not  to  recognize,  but  to  deny  God,  to 
obliterate  from  human  consciousness  every  trace 
of  His  personality. 

Such  is,  however,  the  extreme  negative  out- 
come of  the  Religious  Institution,  which  it  mani- 
fests in  parallelism  with  other  Institutions. 
Religion  at  last  organizes  itself  into  an  Institu- 
tion,  which  is  hostile  to  its  very  source  and  origin, 
namely  the  God-consciousness.  This  peculiar 
phenomenon  has  been  repeatedly  seen  in  the  past, 


410  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

and  it  can  be  observed  in  the  present.  Thus  the 
Religious  Institution  becomes  completely  per- 
verted, turned  inside  out  as  it  were;  it  is  still  a 
Religious  Institution  or  claims  to  be,  yet  with  the 
purpose  of  annihilating  the  creative  soul  of  the 
Religious  Institution. 

Of  this  neojative  movement  in  the  Reliofious 
Institution  we  may  designate  three  distinct  stages 
which  correspond  to  the  same  movement  in 
other  Institutions. 

I.  The  Relio-ious  Institution  as  negati^^e  to  the 
institutional  world  outside  of  itself,  viz.,  the 
secular. 

II.  The  Religious  Institution  as  negative  to  its 
own  institutional  world,  viz.,  the  religious. 

III.  The  Religious  Institution  as  negative  to 
is  own  creative  principle,  as  well  as  that  of  all 
Institutions. 

We  may  note  the  continual  deepening  of  these 
three  stages  till  the  Religious  Institution  reaches 
the  point  of  self-annihilation,  and  must  begin  its 
ascent  in  some  form.  It  has  in  common  with  all 
Institutions,  in  common  with  man  himself,  the 
fall,  the  descent,  which  shows  itself  sooner  or 
later  in  every  religious  organization,  and  which 
we  have  already  noticed  in  the  Family  and  in  So- 
ciety. Something  of  this  negative  countercur- 
rent  may  be  seen  in  every  Religious  Institution 
at  all  times,  though  in  periods  of  disintegration 
it  becomes  the  prevailing  fact.     But,  as  we  shall 


THE  EELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  411 

see,  the  point  of  extreme  self -negation  is  the 
point  of  return  and  restoration ;  the  Evolution  of 
the  Religious  Institution  will  show  its  power  over 
all  the  negative  forces  lurking  in  its  bosom,  and 
will  carry  it  forward  to  a  higher  freedom. 

At  present,  however,  we  shall  proceed  to  unfold 
in  a  little  detail  the  negative  movement  which  has 
been  above  outlined,  and  which  cannot  be  left 
out  of  any  adequate  survey  of  the  present  subject. 
For  the  religious  consciousness  there  is  always  a 
diabolic  part  which  cannot  be  omitted. 

I.  Tlie  Religious  Institution  assails  the  Secu- 
lar Institution.  The  history  of  the  Church 
shows  a  continuous  conflict  with  the  world,  which 
it  has  deemed  outside  of  itself,  and  which  it  hns 
endeavored  to  subject  to  itself.  This  conflict 
reaches  far  back  into  Asia,  culminates  per- 
haps in  medieval  Europe,  yet  is  by  no  means 
extinct  at  the  present  time. 

The  most  striking  manifestation  of  the  antag- 
onism between  the  Religious  and  Secular  Insti- 
tutions is  found  in  monasticism,  which  is  the 
open  separation  and  flight  from  secular  institu- 
tional life.  It  has  flourished  both  in  the  East 
and  West,  fostered  by  very  diverse  religions,  for 
instance  by  Christianity  and  Buddhism.  Monas- 
ticism gives  up  the  problem  of  life  as  secular,  and 
withdraws  into  its  own  isolated  religious  life. 
The  monk  on  the  whole  surrenders  the  world  to 
its  negntivc  forces,  though  he  may  seek  to  trans- 


412  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

form  it  from  the  outside,  that  is,  from  the  inside 
of  his  cloister.  The  three  well-known  monastic 
vows  are  manifestly  directed  against  secular  In- 
stitutions, and  may  be  briefly  glanced  at  in  this 
connection. 

1.  The  vow  of  celibacy  excludes  from  partici- 
pation in  the  Familjs  and  is  of  course  negative 
to  the  domestic  Institution.  The  priesthood  of 
some  branches  of  the  Church  is  required  to 
renounce  marriage.  Thus  the  Religious  Insti- 
tution,  in  seeking  to  complete  its  separation  from 
secularity,  assails  the  primary  Institution  of  man 
whose  function  we  have  already  defined  to  be  the 
reproduction  of  the  individual  as  human  and  insti- 
tutional. Herein  the  Religious  Institution  has 
become  negative  to  man  himself,  to  his  very 
existence.  His  birth  is  the  crowning  evil,  and  his 
life-task  ought  to  be  to  get  rid  of  this  evil,  by  get- 
ting rid  of  himself,  and  indeed  of  selfhood  itself. 

Very  naturally  monasticism  has  thriven  in  the 
Orient,  especially  among  the  Buddhists  with  their 
pessimistic  view  of  man  and  the  world.  In  Occiden- 
tal Christianity  it  has  played  an  important  part, 
and  still  has  its  hold,  though  the  claim  is  made  that 
the  monks  of  the  West  are  very  different  from 
those  of  the  East,  inasmuch  as  the  latter  flee 
from  the  world  as  something  incurably  bad  and 
hopeless,  yea  full  of  contamination  for  the  holy 
man,  while  the  former  propose  to  regenerate  the 
world  from  their  cloistered  retreat. 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  413 

2.  The  vow  of  poverty  is  directed  against 
property,  which  is  the  object  of  the  business 
world,  in  general  of  the  Economic  Order.  The 
individual  taking;  this  vow  is  not  to  live  throug-h 
giving  his  labor  and  receiving  from  the  Social 
Whole  the  value  of  his  product.  Still  he  has 
bodily  wants,  has  hunger  and  thirst,  which  must 
in  some  way  be  satisfied ;  he  needs  raiment  and 
shelter,  however  humble  these  may  be. 

Monasticism  naturally  produces  an  army  of 
beggars,  tramps,  idlers  under  the  guise  of  the 
Religious  Institution.  It  is  true  that  such  re- 
sults may  be  regarded  as  an  abuse  of  the  system. 
Still  there  can  be  little  question  that  monastic 
Orders  have  a  tendency  to  turn  out  parasites  on 
the  Social  Body.  They  have  become  in  some 
countries  a  monstrous  evil,  which  legislation  in 
recent  times  has  sought  to  remedy,  often  by  vio- 
lent repression  and  confiscation.  Monasticism 
at  present  is  said  to  be  adapting  itself  to  the  new 
social  organism  and  is  working  for  a  livelihood, 
like  other  societies  of  people.  The  monastery 
has  and  always  did  have  an  element  of  Commun- 
ism, though  within  the  pale  of  the  Church, 
which  otherwise  has  not  been  lacking  in  the  sense 
of  property. 

3.  The  vow  of  obedience  to  the  Church  runs 
the  danger  of  getting  into  conflict  with  the 
authority  of  the  State,  and  may  become  a  source 
of  trouble  in  certain  unsettled  conditions.    Whom 


414  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

shall  the  member  of  a  monastic  order  obey  in 
the  last  resort?  The  vow  is  to  his  religious  su- 
periors, in  a  hierarchical  line  culminating  in  the 
head  of  the  Church.  Here,  then,  lies  the  con- 
flict, which  is  doubtless  receding  into  the  back- 
ground in  some  countries,  but  in  other  countries 
(as  in  Italy  and  France)  is  a  very  intense  and 
acrid  cause  of  dissension.  The  Religious  Insti- 
tution and  the  Political  Institution  have  by  no 
means  yet  settled  their  troubles  in  Europe. 

The  struo^ofle  comes  down  from  medieval  Cath- 
olicism,  which  had  a  perpetual  cause  of  strife  in 
the  rival  claims  of  Church  and  Empire.  The 
latter  became  separate  in  the  Middle  Ages,  whose 
history  largely  turns  on  the  relation  between 
these  two  independent  Institutions,  each  seeking 
to  subordinate  the  other.  In  the  Orient  the 
priest  and  king  w^ere  ultimately  the  same  person, 
but  medieval  history  has  the  differentiation  be- 
tween the  two  Institutions,  with  two  kinds  of 
rulers  and  their  respective  realms. 

On  the  other  hand  the  State  has  often  sought 
to  determine  the  Church,  especially  in  those 
Protestant  countries  which  have  a  State  Church. 
Thus  secular  ends  creep  into  the  Religious  Insti- 
tution and  divert  it  from  its  supreme  purpose, 
which  means  its  corruption.  On  the  whole  the 
great  movement  of  ecclesiastical  organization  is 
toward  its  independence  of  the  political  body, 
which  is  the  situation  in  the  United  States.     But  if 


TEE  RELIOIOUS  INSTITUTION.  416 

we  go  back  to  Asia,  we  find  their  complete  unity  in 
one  head,  yet  even  there  a  struggle  has  often 
arisen  between  sacerdotal  and  political  authority. 
Europe  has  been  the  arena  of  the  separation  of 
the  two  Institutions,  yet  each  seeking  supremacy 
over  the  other.  To-day  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  in  Europe  is  still  engaged  in  this  struggle, 
and  we  behold  the  unreconciled  dualism  between 
State  and  Church.  Only  in  America  does  there 
seem  to  be  a  peaceful  solution,  in  which  both 
Church  and  State  can  fulfill  unhindered  their 
special  ends,  as  well  as  the  end  they  have  in 
common,  namely  that  both  actualize  freedom  as 
institutional. 

II.  The  Religious  Institution  assails  itself. 
We  have  just  seen  the  Religious  Institution  in  its 
assault  upon  the  secular  institutional  world  which 
lies  outside  of  it,  yet  has  the  same  fundamental 
principle.  But  now  the  Religious  Institution 
divides  within  itself,  splitting  up  into  divisions 
or  sects  which  fight  one  another.  This  inner  sep- 
aration of  the  Religious  Institution  lies  in  its  very 
nature  and  origin ;  it  comes  from  a  division  which 
parts  it  from  the  world,  it  has  an  innate  tendency 
to  separate.  The  negative  might  of  difference, 
or  of  schism,  makes  a  great  deal  of  the  history 
of  the  Church,  and  its  energy  is  by  no  means  yet 
at  an  end. 

It  is  not  intended  to  affirm  that  such  sepa- 
rations are  always  bad.     In  fact  they  belong  up 


416  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIOXS. 

to  a  certain  point  to  the  natural  healthy  develop- 
ment of  the  Eeligious  Institution.  Still  they 
can  generate  the  bitterest  negative  spirit,  and 
transform  the  Religious  Institution  into  a  means 
of  outer  and  inner  enslavement,  which  is  just  the 
opposite  of  its  end.  Thus  it  becomes  self -anni- 
hilating, it  undoes  itself,  and  it  may  well  say  of 
itself  that  Satan  has  crept  into  the  sanctuary  and 
taken  possession. 

1.  Hate  (ofZH<;«  ^/ieo/oi^/ci^m)  is  the  inner  mani- 
festation of  this  disruption  of  the  Religious  In- 
stitution. As  the  injunction  ' '  love  one  another ' ' 
is  the  supreme  one  in  the  Christian  Religion,  so 
its  opposite  has  a  peculiar  baneful  character ;  the 
individual  follows  not  simply  the  natural  impulse 
of  Hate,  but  violates  his  own  deepest  conviction 
and  doctrine.  The  internal  bond  which  makes 
him  a  member  of  the  Religious  Institution  is 
transformed  into  the  spirit  of  its  destruction. 

Of  course  religious  animosity  acts  in  the  name 
of  Religion,  and  beseeches  God  to  be  as  vengeful 
as  it  is.  Thus,  however,  the  meaning  of  God 
is  lost,  the  absolute  Ego  whose  essence  is  to  will 
not  the  personal  wishes  of  the  petitioner,  but 
freedom,  is  made  over  into  a  hateful  vindicator 
of  Hate.  "What  worse  definition  of  the  Evil  One 
can  be  given?  The  Lord  may  employ  human 
vengeance,  not  assisting  it  but  making  it  undo 
itself  in  the  end.  In  general  we  can  say  that 
the  Lord's  hand  is  seen  in  every  negative  move- 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION:  417 

ment  when  it  is  turned  back  upon  itself  and  be- 
comes self-negative. 

Tlie  Religious  Institution  can,  then,  become 
the  fountain  of  that  passion  which  it  ought  to 
extirpate  first  of  all  in  the  human  heart.  But 
it  cannot  stop  with  the  inner  spirit;  it  proceeds 
to  action,  which  means  wrong  and  even  crime. 
^2^  This  subjective  disposition  of  the  sect  or 
separatists  soon  moves  forward  to  the  objective 
deed,  and  endeavors  to  destroy  the  person. 
Hence  arises  the  long  list  of  horrors  found  in 
rehgious  history.  The  heathen  emperors  of 
Rome  persecuted  the  Christians,  who  to  their  fol- 
lowers became  the  martyrs  of  the  Church.  But 
the  Church  turns  about  and  does  the  same  thing 
to  those  who  separate  from  it,  producing  a  new 
martyrology  opposite  to  its  own.  In  the  great 
schism  of  the  sixteenth  century  the  CathoUcs 
burn  the  Protestants  and  the  Protestants  burn 
the  Catholics.  But  the  new  sect  or  division 
which  demanded  freedom  for  itself,  will  not  per- 
mit it  among  its  own  people;  Protestant  burns 
Protestant,  as  Servetus  suffered  at  Geneva  chiefly 
through  efforts  of  Calvin.  In  recent  times  we 
witness  the  same  process  under  milder  forms ; 
now  many  of  the  sects  occupy  themselves  with 
trials  for  heresy,  employing  such  weapons  as 
they  still  keep  in  their  armory,  since  the  State 
will  not  let  them  burn  or  torture  the  body. 
A  contemplation  of  the  negative  part  which 

27 


418  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  Religious  Institution  has  displayed  in  history 
has  driven  some  good  souls  to  a  denial  of  its  mis- 
sion. But  we  may  well  see  that  through  all  this 
conflict  it  is  working  out  its  freedom,  and  its 
conception  of  a  free  God,  though  after  a  diabolic 
fashion. 

3.  This  brings  us  to  the  principle  which  is 
violated  usually  by  both  sides.  Both  destroy 
the  Good,  violate  Love,  disregard  Freedom. 
Each  has  its  own  Form  for  which  it  fights ;  yet 
each  is  trying  to  reveal  the  same  Substance. 
However  different  their  methods,  both  have  God 
as  the  content  of  their  worship. 

Thus  arises  a  complete  separation  between 
Form  and  Substance  in  Religion.  The  cere- 
monial, the  outward  order,  the  creed  of  the  Re- 
ligious Institution  remains,  but  its  inner  spirit 
and  purpose  have  departed.  It  is  at  this  point 
that  the  great  reformer  appears  —  Christ, 
Socrates,  Luther,  etc.  The  religious  organism 
destroys  the  good,  the  moral,  in  fine,  destroys 
the  free  spirit. 

Thus  the  Religious  Institution  is  disrupted 
within,  and  has  internally  undone  itself.  Men 
still  speak  of  doing  God's  Will,  which,  however, 
is  anything  but  divine  and  universal.  So  follows 
the  next  stage,  in  which  we  have  a  Religious  In- 
stitution without  a  God,  who  is  thus  cast  out  of 
his  own  establishment.  This  is  the  complete 
negative   form  of  the  Religious  Organism,  as  it 


THE  BELIOl  O  US  INS  TITU  TION.  4 1 9 

rejects  the  verv  thing  which  created  it,  and  for 
which  it  exists. 

III.  The  Perverted  ReUfjious  Institution.  We 
liave  reached  a  phenomenon  which  has  shown 
itself  in  Orient  and  Occident,  in  ancient  and 
modern  times.  A  Religious  Institution  appears 
whose  object  is  to  deny  and  destroy  the  God- 
consciousness  which  primarily  called  forth  and 
kept  alive  the  Religious  Institution.  An  Insti- 
tution has  begotten  an  Institution  to  undo  an 
Institution ;  such  is  the  extreme  point  of  institu- 
tional perversion.  Such  a  condition  begins  when 
religion  becomes  opposed  to  morals,  when  the 
formal  element  crushes  out  the  ethical  content 
of  religion.  The  moral  consciousness  rises  up,  be- 
comes negative,  and  moves  toward  atheism,  when 
the  Religious  Institution  has  shown  itself  im- 
moral. 

In  three  different  epochs  and  in  three  different 
portions  of  the  world,  the  Perverted  Religious 
Institution  has  come  to  the  front,  indicating  that 
it  has  its  counterpart  in  the  development  of 
humanit3^  The  same  extreme  perversion  we 
found  in  the  Secular  Institution,  which  also  has 
its  process  with  its  own  negation.  The  three 
mentioned  cases  of  the  present  stage  we  may 
note  here,  though  there  are  many  others. 

1.  Buddhism  is  declared  to  be  atheistic  (or 
anti-theistic).  Yet  it  is  a  religion  with  its  wor- 
ship,  creed   and  priesthood.     Some  say  it  is  the 


420  SOCIAL  lysTiruTioys. 

religion  of  a  third  part  of  mankind.  It  has  no 
God,  no  immortality,  and  no  freedom  of  the  in- 
stitutional kind.  Its  appeal  seems  to  be  alto- 
gether to  the  individual,  who  is,  however,  to  get 
rid  of  his  individuality.  It  developed  out  of 
Brahminism,  against  whose  practices  it  was  a 
moral  reaction.  According  to  Buddha,  the  E^o, 
human  and  divine,  has  no  existence;  though  it 
appears,  yet  its  appearance  is  something  that 
ought  not  to  be. 

It  may  be  said  that  Buddhism  has  shown  itself 
the  most  persistent  of  all  religions .  It  is  some  five 
or  six  hundred  years  older  than  Christianity,  and 
to-day  some  authorities  state  that  there  are  more 
Buddhists  among  mankind  than  there  are  Chris- 
tians. Still  it  is  a  religion  not  easily  understood  by 
Occidentals,  who  often  make  opposite  statements 
concerning  the  purport  of  leading  doctrines. 
Then  it  has  a  variety  of  sects  which  formulate  its 
tenets  differently;  particularly  the  great  division 
into  Northern  and  Southern  Buddhism  is  well- 
known. 

2.  The  second  period  of  the  Perverted  Relig- 
ious Institution  was  the  , Greco-Roman,  which 
flourished  some  two  or  three  centuries  preceding 
and  following  the  birth  of  Christ.  The  philos- 
ophers, Plato  and  Aristotle,  still  spoke  of  God, 
or  the  Divine,  yet  religion  or  its  philosophy  can- 
not be  said  to  be  an  integral  part  of  their  systems. 
After  their  time  the  cultured  world  quite  lost  the 


THE  EELI&IOUS  INSTITUTION.  421 

God-consciousness,  the  best  spirits  took  to  the 
study  of  Ethics  as  the  only  solution  of  the  prob- 
lem of  the  universe.  Stoicism  and  Epicureanism 
chiefly  dealt  in  ethical  categories,  though  not  ex- 
clusively; the  old  religion,  both  Greek  and 
Roman,  retained  some  of  its  rites  for  the  people, 
but  not  only  Pan  was  dead  but  the  whole  Greco- 
Eoman  Pantheon  was  dying. 

At  this  time  we  see  schools,  sects,  fraternities, 
in  their  organization  partaking  of  the  Religious 
Institution,  yet  thinking,  acting,  even  worship- 
ing without  a  God.  No  divine  Person,  but  ab- 
stract Personification  held  sway  at  Rome,  which 
became  ethical,  and  reduced  the  world  to  its  eth- 
ical category  —  Justice.  Into  this  godless  though 
ethical  world,  it  was  the  function  of  Christianity 
to  bring  back  God,  the  absolute  Person. 

3.  A  third  period  of  the  Perverted  Religious 
Institution  belongs  to  our  own  time  and  its  neg- 
ative spirit.  The  central  work  around  which  the 
modern  movement  turns  is  Kant's  Critique  of 
Pure  Reason,  which  in  its  essence  is  a  Titanic 
assault  upon  the  God-consciousness.  The  result 
is  that  many  societies,  religious  in  form  and 
origin,  are  non-theistic,  if  not  actually  atheistic. 
Often  they  apply  the  word  free  to  themselves. 
Free  Religionists,  Free  Thinkers,  etc.  But  this 
freedom  is  nudnly  negative. 

Undoubtedly  these  sects  are  benevolent,  ethi- 
cal, humane;  they    arc  like  Buddhism,  like  the 


422  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Greco-Roman  schools  of  philosophy,  in  being  a 
moral  reaction  against  external  or  corrupt  re- 
ligion. Now  the  word  is  agnosticism,  the  whole 
domain  of  religion  is  thrown  out  of  man's  spir- 
itual interest. 

There  is  a^  tendency  in  all  these  forms  to  go 
back  to  the  Orient  and  to  fraternize  especially 
with  Buddhism,  which  has  lasted  so  long. 
The  Greco-Roman  Schools  of  Philosophy  which 
stood  in  the  place  of  the  Religious  Institution, 
have  vanished,  they  had  not  the  enduring  power 

of  Buddhism .     Thus  the  Negative  Religious  lusti- 
er c 

tution  took  the  form  of  a  Religion  in  the  Orient, 
the  home  of  Religion,  but  it  took  the  form  of 
Philosophy  in  the  Greek  world,  the  original 
home  of  Philosophy.  But  its  modern  form  is 
rather  psychological,  the  denial  of  knowledge  or 
knowability — agnosticism.  Religions  philosophi- 
cal, psychological,  scientific,  temples  of  worship, 
schools  of  philosophers  with  the  one  Avise  man  at 
the  head,  societies  of  many  sorts  we  behold  shoot- 
ing up  everywhere  in  more  or  less  decided  protest 
ao;ainst  the  God-consciousness. 

The  Perverted  Religious  Institution  we  call  the 
whole  class,  not  saying  that  they  are  immoral, 
for  they  are  not,  being  for  the  most  part  a  reac- 
tion from  religion  to  morality.  They  are  not 
domestic,  political  or  social  bodies;  they  are  re- 
ligious, even  though  they  are  organized  for  the 
purpose   of  denying  or  ignoring  what  called  the 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  423 

Religious  Institution  into  existence,   namely  the 
God-consciousness. 

Here  the  Religious  Institution  has  reached  the 
point  of  self-contradiction  and  self -negation.  It 
is  thrown  back  to  its  beo-inninof  and  takes  a  new 
start,  asking  "what  is  my  origin?  "  The  nega- 
tion of  religion  means  for  us  to  rub  all  out  and  to 
commence  over  again;  particularly  we  should 
erase  the  institutional  world.  We  have  seen  that 
certain  forms  of  socialism  do  not  stop  with  the 
negation  of  the  social  order,  but  insist  upon  the 
negation  of  religion  also,  which  is  indeed  getting 
to  the  bottom  of  things. 

Such  then,  we  take  to  be  the  general  sweep  of 
the  Negative  Religious  Institution,  terminating  in 
its  complete  perversion.  Religion,  like  every 
other  good  thing  in  this  world,  has  in  it  an  ele- 
ment which  is  always  turning  bad,  or  rather  an 
element  which  the  free  Ego  is  alwaj's  perverting 
to  evil.  Take  the  following  passage  from  the 
New  Testament  (Acts  II. ) :  "  And  all  that  believed 
were  together  and  had  all  thinofs  in  common  ;  and 
sold  their  possessions  and  goods,  and  parted  them 
to  all  men,  as  every  man  had  need."  Very  inno- 
cent do  the  words  sound,  but  they  have  been 
employed  to  break  up  Family,  Society  and  State; 
they  have  generated  communistic  schemes  by  the 
hundreds,  and  their  influence  is  not  yet  past  by 
any  means.  Another  passage:  "The  time  is 
short,  it  remaineth  that  both  they  that  have  wives 


424  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

be  as  though  they  had  none."  Quit  your  wives, 
for  the  kingdom  of  Heaven  is  at  liand,  and  that 
does  not  tolerate  marriage  or  the  Family :  so  the 
Rappists  interpret  the  words  of  the  Holy  Book, 
and  form  a  society  of  celibates  who  sever  the 
closest  ties  of  human  existence  in  order  to  attain 
an  utterly  selfish  salvation. 

Even  worse  is  the  case  of  the  Oneida  Perfec- 
tionists, who  claimed  to  carry  out  the  pure  doc- 
trine of  the  New  Testament  in  its  true  universality. 
Not  only  goods  were  held  in  common,  but  also 
wives,  or  rather  women;  the  same  sin  lay  at  the 
bottom  of  the  individual  possession  of  a  wife  as 
of  piece  of  land.  Personal  ownership  is  the  devil 
whom  Christ  came  to  drive  out  of  the  world. 
Nothing  is  to  be  your  own,  least  of  all,  wife  and 
child ;  if  you  dare  think  of  them  asyour  own  and 
love  them,  you  have  committed  the  great  sin  for 
which  severe  religious  discipline  must  be  inflicted. 
Mr.  Nordhoff  in  his  book  (  Communistic  Societies 
of  the  United  States,  p.  292)  has  given  an  ac- 
count of  a  scene  at  which  he  was  present  during 
such  a  discipline  at  Oneida.  A  young  man  was 
charged  with  thinking  too  much  of  the  young 
woman  who  had  been  assigned  to  him  by  the 
society  for  the  purpose  of  "  stirpiculture,"  and 
who  expected  to  make  him  a  father.  The  charge 
was  proven  and  he  was  required  to  abandon  her 
and  hand  her  over  to  another  man,  in  order  to 
atone  for  the  great  sin  of  loving  the  mother  of 
his  unborn  child. 


THE  BELIGIvUS  INSTITUTION.  426 

This  of  course  far  outstrips  monasticism  in  its 
assault  upon  the  monogamous  Family.  For 
monasticism  simply  abstained  from  marriage  and 
made  its  followers  celibates,  but  the  Oneida 
doctrine  assails  directly  the  love  of  man  and 
woman  as  the  basis  of  the  domestic  Institution, 
condemning  it  as  the  "  exclusive  and  idolatrous 
attachment  of  two  for  each  other,"  which  it  is 
the  first  duty  of  the  religion  of  Christ  to  root  out 
of  the  human  heart.  No  lascivious  custom  of 
the  lowest  tribes  of  the  human  race,  no  passage 
in  the  most  besotted  literature  of  heathen  an- 
tiquity when  it  was  sinl?ing  out  of  existence  in  its 
last  sensual  debauch,  excites  such  disgust  as  this 
"  Christian  Institution." 

And  yet  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  founder  of 
the  Oneida  community  was  a  man  of  conscience ; 
so  too  were  his  followers.  What  conscience  can 
become  when  it  casts  off  the  training  of  the  race 
to  institutional  life  can  be  seen  in  this  example, 
though  conscience  be  called  the  supreme  ethical 
arbiter  and  even  "  the  voice  of  God  Himself." 
On  the  whole,  Oneida  has  given  the  most  complete 
instance  hitherto  realized,  of  the  Negative  Ee- 
lio;ious  Institution — a  Religious  Institution  which 
directly  and  positively  annihilates  Religion  as  it 
has  unfolded  in  the  evolutionary  movement  of  the 
race.  This  movement  the  reader  will  now  con- 
template with  relief  in  what  follows. 


42G  SOCIAL  lySTITUTIONS. 

III.     The   Evolution   of   the  Eeligious 
Institution. 

Just  as  in  the  most  highly  organized  Relig- 
ious Institution  there  is  a  continual  descent 
toward  Atheism,  a  lapse  to  the  negation  of  the 
God-consciousness,  so  there  is  the  corresponding 
ascent,  the  rise  out  of  its  lowest  forms  which  re- 
enacts  substantially  the  development  of  religion 
in  the  race,  and  of  the  Religious  Institution. 
Thus  the  negative  element  is  seen  to  be  always 
in  the  process  of  being  undone,  overcome,  trans- 
cended. This  is  the  reason  why  the  Evolution 
of  the  Religious  Institution  among  men,  as  w^ell 
as  of  other  Institutions,  means  so  much  in  our 
day.  To  the  inner  decay  of  institutional  life,  of 
which  instances  can  be  pointed  out  in  many 
places,  and  which  is  not  to  be  disguised,  there  is 
the  corresponding  countercurrent  in  the  other 
direction,  the  incessant  re-birth  and  fresh  unfold- 
ing of  the  Religious  Institution  in  the  present. 
The  Evolution  of  Religions  is  not,  therefore,  to 
be  considered  an  isolated  movement,  it  is  the 
answer  and  the  antidote  to  the  negative  religious 
movement. 

The  beginning  of  Religion  is  not  to  be  located 
internally  (in  some  special  faculty  or  activit}') 
nor  externally  (in  some  special  place  where  it  was 
revealed  to  man).  The  human  consciousness 
and  the  God-consciousness  are  counterparts,  and 


THE  BELI0I0U8  INSTITUTION.  427 

belong  together,  and  develop  together;  the  first 
self-knowinff  of  the  Egro  is  the  first  eoffnition  of 
the  divine  Ego ;  I  cannot  know  myself  as  know- 
ing the  world  without  recoo^nizino-  the  absolute 
Self  in  the  world.  The  basic  fact  of  epistem- 
ology  is  that  all  cognition  (from  sensation  up  to 
thought)  is  recognition  (of  the  Ego  in  the  object, 
even  of  the  absolute  Ego  itself). 

Given  man  as  self-conscious,  then,  he  is  in  the 
same  act  God-conscious,  and  in  the  same  degree. 
When  he  begins  to  know  himself,  he  beoins  to 
know  God ;  or  we  may  turn  the  statement  about 
and  say,  when  he  begins  to  know  God,  he  begins 
to  know  himself — Self  beings  both  and  in  both, 
human  and  divine.  Here  lies  the  primal  basis  of 
Theism  ;  the  total  Ego  in  its  first  conscious  act  of 
knowing  is  theistic,  it  gets  aware  of  the  absolute 
Ego  as  the  o-round  of  its  own  being  as  Ego,  and 
seeks  it  as  the  creative  source  of  itself. 

At  this  point  we  see  the  primordial  theistic  act : 
this  finite  human  Ego  must  make  itself  one  with 
the  infinite  divine  Ego ;  the  former  must  will  the 
Will  of  the  latter,  yet  for  the  purpose  of  vindi- 
cating the  former.  That  is,  man  wills  God's  Will, 
yet  God'sAVill  is  ultimately  to  secure  man's  Will. 
All  human  Will  is  not  to  carry  itself  out  individ- 
ually and  immediately,  but  universally  and  medi- 
atelv,  through  the  absolute  Will.  The  particular 
Person  must  subordinate  himself  to  the  universal 
Person,    whose   end   is   to    secure  the  particular 


428  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Person — not  one,  but  all.  The  immediate  or 
natural  "Will  is  anti-institutional ;  it  must  will  the 
universal  "Will  in  order  to  attain  itself  as  "V^^ill 
through  Institutions.  The  Eeliojious  Institution 
in  its  humblest  stage  mediates  the  rude  desire, 
passion,  impulse  of  the  individual,  and  compels 
the  act  of  the  savage  to  be  religious,  first  of  all, 
and  that  is  the  beginning  of  Theism. 

The  theistic  act  has  manv  forms  and  gradations, 
manifestino;  itself  from  the  lowest  to  the  highest 
of  humanity.  "What  is  the  best  method  of  order- 
ing the  very  complicated  phenomena  of  the  relig- 
ious consciousness  is  a  C[uestion  which  has  been 
variously  answered  by  investigators,  and  the  sub- 
ject is  still  under  discussion.  Still  we  believe 
that  certain  lines  can  be  run  through  this  dark, 
confused  and  partly  unexplored  territory  which 
will  help  the  reader  see  its  general  boundary  as 
well  as  the  outlines  of  its  main  provinces. 

"We  shall  first  endeavor  to  bring  out  the  com- 
mon 3'et  more  or  less  implicit  element  in  all  re- 
ligions;  then  we  shall  look  at  this  one  inner 
genetic  element  unfolding  into  the  vast  multi- 
phcity  of  religions ;  finally  we  shall  seek  to  dis- 
cover the  process  which  is  working  in  all  these 
religions,  to  the  end  of  realizing  itself  in  one  re- 
ligion,  or  rather  in  one  Religious  Institution. 
These  stages  we  shall  designate  as  follows  :  — 

I.  The  JJnireligious  Proce^is,  which  gives  the 
primal    living  germ  of   religion  in  the    Self,  or 


THE  BELIGIOVS  INSTITUTION.  429 

Ego,  and  which  generates  all  the  diversity  of  re- 
ligious beliefs  among  men  —  which  fact  leads  us 
to  the  next  stage. 

II.  The  Multireligious  Process,  which  deals 
with  the  religions  of  the  world  in  their  separa- 
tion, seeking  the  principle  of  organizing  them, 
and  applying  it  to  the  vast  chaotic  mass,  which 
thus  begins  to  manifest  an  inner  psychological 
order  realizino;  itself  in  a  new  religious  Institu- 
tion  —  wherewith  we  come  to  the  following. 

III.  The  Omnireligioiis  JProcess,  which  has  to 
do  with  the  process  of  all  religions  in  their  mul- 
tiplicity unfolding  into  the  one  universal  Religion, 
wdiich  is  actualized  in  an  Institution.  Thus  the 
third  process  is  a  return  to  the  first  or  unireligious 
principle,  which,  however,  has  now  become 
actual  through  the  multireligious  Process  in  the 
united  Institution  of  Religion,  all-embracing, 
freedom-securing,  truly  catholic  or  universal. 
Such,  at  least,  is  the  outlook  which  we  have  to 
take  at  this  point,  though  the  reality  be  still 
distant. 

In  the  Religious  Institution  the  ordering  is  far 
more  intricate  and  complex  than  in  the  Secular 
Institution.  The  latter  has  the  one  starting- 
point  in  the  human  Ego  evolving  itself  on  a 
single  line  toward  institutional  freedom,  through 
the  mastery  over  Nature  within  and  without. 
(See  the  preceding  instances  in  Family  and  So- 
ciety.)    But  the  Religious  Institution  has  two 


430  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Egos,  the  liuinan  and  the  divine,  in  its  process, 
both  also  starting-points  and  both  originative  and 
self-determining  by  their  very  character,  yet  both 
at  opposite  poles  of  the  universe.  Nor  is  Nature 
absent  with  her  determinations,  adding  to  the 
infinite  variety  of  religious  manifestation.  Sci- 
ence in  these  days  is  apt  to  take  its  point  of  view 
and  its  method  from  the  Nature-element  in  re- 
ligion, but  this  procedure  is  insufficient  though  it 
is  not  to  be  left  out.  The  human  soul  and  God 
also  belong  in  the  religious  process  of  humanity, 
furnishing  not  merely  material  for  the  so-called 
Science  of  Eeligion,  but  being  its  two  creative 
centers,  opposite  indeed  as  finite  and  infinite,  but 
always  coming  together  and  uniting  themselves 
in  the  supreme  act  of  Free-Will  unfolding  itself 
in  the  Kelioious  Institution. 

I,  The  Unireligious  Process.  The  term 
religion  implies  that  there  is  a  common  religious 
act  in  all  humanity.  The  humble  savage  and  the 
cultivated  Christian  are  both  religious;  can  we 
catch  and  formulate  the  factor  which  joins  both 
in  this  unity?  If  it  is  possible  to  do  so,  we  have 
reached  down  to  the  unireligious  Process  in  man. 

In  all  religions  there  is  a  movement  conceived 
to  be  of  the  Divine  Ego,  which  is  also  the  move- 
ment of  man's  own  primordial  Self.  In  all 
religions  there  are  found  three  fundamental 
agencies  or  rather  agents,  who  differ  completely 
from  one  another,  yet  are  in  more  or  less  prom- 


THE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION:  431 

inent  co-operation  for  the  government  of  the 
world.  These  are  positive,  negative,  and  medi- 
atorial, or  God,  Devil,  and  Restorer.  Thousand- 
fold are  the  forms  which  this  original  process  of 
religion  takes  on  amono-  mankind.  Sometimes 
one  of  these  divine  Persons  seems  to  disappear 
or  to  be  suppressed,  often  two  of  them  are  openly 
put  out ;  still  they  will  intrude  themselves  in 
clear  daylight  at  times,  and  are  always  at  work 
secretly,  giving  abundant  occupation  to  God  and 
Man. 

Let  us  take,  for  illustration,  that  Book  which 
has  been  the  religious  trainer  of  a  large,  and,  as 
we  think,  of  the  most  advanced  part  of  the  human 
race,  the  Hebrew  Bible.  Tts  glorious  theme  is 
the  one  only  God,  Creator  of  Heaven  and  Earth, 
of  Man  and  the  Cosmos.  All  the  animals,  the 
sun  and  moon  and  firmament  He  evokes  from 
chaos  by  His  fiat ;  He  creates  the  first  human 
pair  and  places  them  in  the  primordial  Home, 
Eden.  But  who  is  this  who  now  appears  upon 
the  scene,  rather  unexpectedly?  We  thought  we 
had  all  Creation  before  us,  but  here  comes  a  new 
agent,  of  whom  no  account  has  hitherto  been 
given;  apparently  somewhere  from  the  outside 
he  creeps  into  this  created  world  and  asserts  his 
part  in  it  with  very  considerable  effect. 

Thus  the  Old  Testament  opens  with  an  account 
which  is  characteristic  of  the  whole  of  it,  for  the 
Devil's  part  runs  through  it  from  beginning  to 


i82  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

end.  Not  well  can  the  matter  be  otherwise,  for 
with  him  is  the  grand  contlict ;  the  arch-fiend  is 
not  a  shadowy  specter  to  the  old  Hebrew,  but 
exists  and  is  at  work  in  the  world.  Else  indeed 
the  Holy  Book  of  the  Ages  were  merely  the 
record  of  a  sham  battle.  There  is  no  doubt, 
however,  that  this  element  is  kept  in  the  back- 
ground of  the  Old  Testament,  it  is  not  yet  fully 
explicit  or  acknowledged,  or  possibly  it  is  inten- 
tionally suppressed.  For  Egypt  lies  behind 
Judea,  and  Egypt  had  its  Apophis  or  the  Serpent 
in  one  of  its  sacred  Triads.  The  Mosaic  reac- 
tion or  reformation  is  anti-Egyptian,  yet  cannot 
help  showing  its  origin.  So  that  Egyptian 
Apophis  creeps  into  the  Hebrew  creation  and 
stays  there  in  spite  of  all  attempts  to  drive  him 
out.  Nay,  we  shall  see  at  last  that  he  comes  to 
be  openly  acknowledged. 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  the  great  monothe- 
istic book,  the  Hebrew  Bible,  is  really  dualistic, 
has  to  be  so  in  order  to  be  a  Bible;  yes,  it  has  to 
be  so  in  order  to  be  religious  at  all.  Unless  this 
two-foldness  or  self-opposition  were  in  it,  it  could 
find  no  response  in  the  religious  consciousness  or 
in  any  consciousness.  The  Hebrew  starting-point 
as  shown  in  Creation,  when  seen  in  its  complete- 
ness, is  not  monotheistic  but  rather  ditheistic, 
not  intentionally  so,  it  would  seem,  yet  really  so. 
The  reader  will  understand  that  I  do  not  consider 
this  to  be  a  defect ;  rather  is  it  a  necessity  of 


THE  BELIOIOUS  INSTITUTION.  438 

religion,  indeed  a  necessity  of  mind  itself.  The 
whole  history  of  the  Bible  shows  that  it  has  un- 
conscious strands  running  throuo;h  it  which  are 
far  deeper  than  its  conscious  ones,  and  which 
succeedino;  ao;es  brinof  to  liojht  along:  with  their 
own  spiritual  birth  and  development. 

Nor  must  we  omit  to  note  with  attention  that 
the  third  principle  of  the  universal  religious  Triad, 
that  of  Mediation,  Restoration,  Salvation,  is  also 
found  in  the  Old  Testament.  The  line  of  Hebrew 
Worthies,  Patriarch,  Lawgiver,  King,  Prophet, 
were  incarnations  of  the  mediating  principle  scat- 
tered down  Time,  not  perfect,  yet  suggesting  and 
often  prophesying  the  Perfect  One  who  was  to 
come.  In  fact  the  grand  object  of  the  Bible  is 
to  mediate  God  with  fallen  man,  the  victim  of 
Satan,  that  second  Person,  deemed  extra-human 
and  extra-divine,  who  has  slipped  into  Creation, 
and  who  can  be  overcome,  apparently  not  by  God 
as  immediate,  but  through  man's  own  mediating 
power. 

So  we  may  aiErm  that  the  Old  Testament  has 
as  its  essential  process  what  we  have  called  the 
fundamental  religious  Triad,  which  is  the  crea- 
tive movement  of  tlie  God-consciousness  itself. 
But  it  has  this  in  an  implicit,  not  yet  developed, 
largely  unconscious  form.  It  is  true  that  some 
theologians  have  thought  that  they  must  somehow 
get  rid  of  the  part  of  Satan  or  the  Evil  One  in 
the  earlier  portions  of  the  Old  Testament,  this 

28       


434  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

being  done  in  the  interest  of  an  abstract  and  nar- 
row monotheism.  Even  the  cunning  Serpent  has 
been  sophisticated  out  of  Eden  by  theological  inge- 
nuity, which  claims  that  the  serpent  there  is  ♦«  an 
animal  and  nothing  more,"  a  mere  snake  crawl- 
ing among  the  bushes  of  Paradise.  The  curse 
pronounced  upon  it  is  for  its  "  animal  nature," 
which  of  course  it  cannot  help,  and  the  Lord's 
execration  is  directed  against  an  innocent  object. 
Or  shall  we  mitigate  animosity  into  profanity  in 
this  case,  considering  the  Lord  to  have  exclaimed 
to  a  disagreeable  reptile  on  his  path,  in  true  an- 
thropomorphic fashion,  "  damn  the  snake."  To 
such  dilemmas  our  theological  brethren  sometimes 
reduce  us  by  their  exegesis. 

The  preceding  duaHsm,  God  and  Satan,  Good 
and  Evil,  became  a  conscious  element  of  the  He- 
brew religion  through  the  Babvlonian  Captivitv, 
which  brought  them  into  contact  with  the  Persian 
mind.  This,  as  is  well  known,  makes  two  oppos- 
ing self-existent  deities  (Ahuramazda  and  Aura- 
mainyu)  the  basic  principle  of  the  Godhead.  It 
is  the  most  influential  and  persistent  form  of 
Ditheism  that  has  yet  arisen  among  men,  and  it 
still  exists,  doubtless  in  a  modified  form,  among 
the  Parsees  of  the  Orient.  In  the  age  of  the  New 
Testament  the  Jews  are  full  of  the  consciousness 
of  Satan,  and  Christ  repeatedly  speaks  of  him 
and  takes  him  for  granted  in  the  minds  of  his 
hearers.     And   their   Messianic  hope  rests  upon 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION^.  436 

that  as  yet  unrealized  third  Person,  the  Deliverer, 
who  has  been  an  ideal  element  of  their  conscious- 
ness quite  from  their  beginning. 

Now  this  process  which  we  have  just  traced  in 
the  Old  Testament,  and  which,  imaged  as  tri- 
personal  yet  as  one  great  process  of  man's  res- 
toration, is  to  become  fully  explicit  in  the  New 
Testament,  is  really  one  form  of  the  unireligious 
process,  which  must  be  found  in  every  religion 
to  make  it  religion.  We  may  deem  it  the  pri- 
mordial religious  cell,  out  of  which  are  produced 
all  religions  in  all  their  diverse  manifestations 
from  the  lowest  to  the  highest.  In  the  savage  it 
is  only  a  simple  cell  with  its  nucleus  or  nucleolus, 
still  it  is  the  creative  archetypal  form  which  un- 
folds into  the  most  complex  religious  organism. 
By  such  an  illustration  we  do  not  wish  to  imply 
that  this  is  a  biological  process ;  on  the  contrary 
it  is  that  of  the  Ego  itself  in  the  movement  of 
its  very  selfhood. 

We  repeat  that  as  soon  as  man  is  self-con- 
scious, he  must  be  God-conscious ;  the  human 
Ego  and  the  divine  Ego  are  correlates,  the  one 
cannot  center  itself  within  except  by  centering 
the  Self  without,  in  the  world,  at  the  same  time 
and  in  the  same  degree.  Often  it  has  been  no- 
ticed that  the  little  child,  at  the  dawning  of  con- 
sciousness and  of  speech ,  seems  to  be  in  a  peculiarly 
intimate  relation  to  the  Invisible  Person,  speak- 
ing and  thinking  of  Him  in  a  way  that  is  its  own, 


I 


436  ISOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

and  not  an  echo  of  its  environment.  To  account 
for  this  fact  some  poets  and  some  philosophers 
have  conceived  of  a  pre-existent  state  of  unity 
with  God  which  the  born  soul  best  remembers  in 
early  childhood.  And  the  primitive  man  as  a 
rule  calls  up  far  more  easily,  and  communes  with 
far  more  directly,  his  deity  than  does  the  civil- 
ized man.  It  is  often  said  that  the  child  is 
nearer  God  than  the  grown  person,  which  means 
that  the  child  is  nearer  to  its  God  than  the  grown 
person  is  to  his,  which  means  again  that  the  child's 
Ego  is  not  so  widely  separated  from  its  divine 
counterpart  as  is  that  of  the  grown  person. 
Years  and  culture  deepen  the  chasm  betw  een  God 
and  man,  who  however  must  be  united ;  the  more 
advanced  civilization  requires  the  more  profound 
mediation  between  the  human  and  divine  Egos. 
The  sacred  Triad  is  the  fundamental  chord  or 
the  key-note  which  runs  through  the  whole  sym- 
phony of  man's  religion  and  unifies  all  its  divine 
notes  into  one  harmony. 

With  the  coming  of  the  doctrine  of  Evolution, 
new  questions  have  been  raised  in  regard  to  the 
origin  of  the  Ego.  When  did  the  Self  break 
through  the  veil  of  Nature  into  its  own  sanctuary 
and  there  behold  itself  face  to  face?  Very  vague 
at  first  and  very  slow  must  have  been  the  process ; 
still  it  must  have  had  its  limits  in  time,  the  before 
and  the  after.  With  greater  definiteness  the 
place  can  be  pointed  where  the  human  animal,  or 


TEE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  487 

perchance  the  man-monkey  first  got  a  peep  into 
the  lookino^-srlass  of  his  own  soul  and  then  began 
to  know  himself.  Many  historic  indications  cause 
us  to  turn  our  faces  to  the  Valley  of  the  Nile  as 
the  arena  of  man's  earliest  self -awareness,  the 
most  important  epoch  in  his  history,  namely  that 
which  made  him  man.  But  more  emphatically 
than  any  recorded  fact  does  Nature  select  the 
land  of  Egypt  for  man's  primordial  initiation  into 
manhood.  From  the  providential  Nile-hand 
reaching  out  of  the  Unknown  and  feeding  the 
dwellers  of  the  Valley  arose  the  God-conscious- 
ness along  with  its  corresponding  man-conscious- 
ness, and  therewith  also  began  civilization. 

Ancient  Herodotus  tells  us  that  the  Egyptians 
were  still  in  his  time  the  most  religious  of  men, 
though  he  saw  them  when  they  were  certainly 
several  and  probably  many  thousand  years  old. 
Egypt  is  doubtless  the  home  of  the  Religious 
Institution.  That  which  we  called  the  primor- 
dial religious  cell,  the  divine  Triad,  is  found  in 
Egypt  at  a  very  early  period  and  through  all  its 
history.  This  Egyptian  Trinity,  though  often 
broken  up  and  scattered  into  a  vast  multiplicity 
of  deities,  is  what  persists  underneath  and 
through  them  all,  and  finally  is  transmitted  or 
rather  transforms  itself  into  the  Christian  Trin- 
ity. The  fundamental  religious  Triad  of  Egypt 
is  Osiris  the  Creator,  Typhon  the  Destroyer,  and 
Horus  the  Restorer.     With  Osiris  the  male  is 


438  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

often  coupled  Isis  the  female,  their  son  is  Horus ; 
thus  rises  the  divine  Triad  as  domestic,  Father, 
Mother,  Child.  It  is  of  interest  to  note  that  the 
old  Egyptians  put  the  mother-principle  as  well 
as  the  father-principle  into  their  Godhead. 
Moreover  Isis  the  mother  with  her  child  Horus 
in  her  arms  was  an  object  of  popular  worship  in 
Egypt,  and  was  reproduced  in  thousands  of  pic- 
tures. Here  is  the  prototype  of  the  Madonna 
and  Bambino.  But  what  shall  we  say  to  that 
element  of  the  Osiris  myth  which  recounts  the 
suffering,  death  and  resurrection  of  a  God,  who 
is  too  a  member  of  the  divine  Triad?  Then  we 
find  also  the  idea  in  Egypt  that  an  atoning  sac- 
rifice of  a  God  is  necessary  for  the  salvation  of 
man.  The  Egyptians  were  in  one  Avay  polythe- 
istic, but  through  all  the  multiplicity  of  their 
Gods  runs  the  conception  of  Trinity  as  the  uni- 
religious  process  both  of  themselves  and  of  their 
deities.  And  there  is  strong  probability  (for  it 
cannot  yet  be  settled  as  a  fact),  that  this  process 
dawned  upon  the  human  Ego  in  the  Nile  Valley. 
Still  we  find  it  everywhere.  In  the  Vedas  the 
religious  Triad  is  present,  working  more  or  less 
implicitly  in  the  deities  Indra,  Agni  (or  Rudra) 
and  Vishnu  (or  Mitra).  Vishnu  is  often  men- 
tioned in  the  Vedas  and  is  specially  distinguished 
for  his  three  steps  which  measure  all  things. 
Far  more  explicit  is  the  triune  movement  in  later 
Brahminism,  which  has  the  one  supreme    deity 


THE  EELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  489 

who  by  self -contemplation  produces  the  universe — 
Brahma;  second  is  Siva  or  Mahadeva,  the  De- 
stroyer; third  is  Vishnu  the  Restorer.  This  is 
the  Hindoo  Trimunti,  whose  sacred  name  is  pro- 
nounced trinally  in  the  three  letters,  A,  U,  M. 
A  Triad  has  also  been  pointed  out  in  Buddhism, 
which  seems  to  be  largel}'^  an  offshoot  of  the 
Destroyer.  Another  great  world-religion  which 
developed  out  of  early  Hindooism  was  the  Per- 
sian religion,  that  of  Zoroaster.  This  is  famous 
for  its  pronounced  Dualism,  its  positive  and  neg- 
ative Gods  in  eternal  conflict.  Still  it  developed 
its  mediating  third  deity  in  Mithras  whose  worship 
was  well  known  to  later  Rome,  but  was  probably 
active  in  an  implicit  way  in  the  earliest  Persian 
religion,  since  the  name  is  that  of  one  of  the 
Vedic  Gods. 

In  the  Taoism  of  China  the  religious  Triad  has 
been  found.  A  European  author  has  declared 
that  "  the  mystery  of  the  Holy  Trinity  was  re- 
vealed to  the  Chinese  five  centuries  before  the 
coming  of  Jesus  Christ,''  in  a  work  by  Lao-tsze, 
who  speaks  of  "  the  three  inscrutables  which  are 
combined  into  one,"  and  declares  the  product 
of  Supreme  Reason  to  be  "  unity  which  begets 
duality  which  begets  trinity,"  the  latter  then  be- 
getting "  ten  thousand  things."  Three  princi- 
ples are  announced  "  Yin  the  positiv^e,  Yang  the 
negative,  and  Chi^  the  harmonizer."  (Seethe 
Tao-teli-Mng ,  c.  42,  translation  by  Carus.) 


440  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Thus  we  seek  to  bring  before  the  mind  thi.s 
unireligious  Process,  which  may  be  taken  as  the 
primordial  genetic  unit  (or  cell)  out  of  which 
have  come  all  religions.  It  is  a  Process,  ulti- 
matel}'^  the  triple  Process  of  the  Ego,  that  of  the 
Divine  Ego  as  first  grasped  and  uttered  by  the 
human  Ego.  The  primal  Triad  we  may  name  it, 
or  the  original  Divine  Psychosis,  which  underlies 
and  creates  all  forms  of  Religion,  showing  them 
in  their  positive,  negative,  and  restorative  ele- 
ments, as  they  appear  implicitly,  in  the  begin- 
ning. Such  is  the  common  relio^ious  act  belongino^ 
to  the  total  human  race,  from  the  lowest  to  the 
highest.  It  is  just  this  primal  Triad  which  is  to 
unfold  with  the  unfolding  of  the  race. 

Here,  in  this  unfolding,  we  reach  the  next 
grand  fact  of  Religion,  its  stupendous  diversity 
corresponding  to  the  diversity  of  institutions, 
peoples,  races,  civilizations.  The  original  relig- 
ious unit  is  now  to  express  itself  in  every  phase 
of  externality.  Being  the  product  of  the  Ego 
and  expressing  the  Ego,  it  must  have  the  hitter's 
separativeness  or  self-division,  which  manifests 
itself  in  the  diversity  of  religion  thousandfold. 
Accordingly,  we  shall  now  pass  to  this  stage, 
which  is  the  second  in  the  Evolution  of  the  Re- 
ligious Institution  of  mankind. 

II.  The  Multireligious  Process.  This,  as 
its  name  indicates,  takes  into  account  the  multi- 
plicity of   Religions,  which  is  the  most  striking 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  441 

external  fact  about  them.  All  Religious  are  one 
by  their  very  designation,  yet  they  are  also  many, 
and  this  manyness  proceeds  from  the  oneness, 
and  will  return  to  it,  as  we  shall  find  later.  The 
religious  Triad  we  are  to  see  taking  on  form, 
which  will  be  greatly  diversified  in  its  outer  man- 
ifestation. 

Just  here  rises  the  chief  difficulty  in  the  study 
of  what  is  usually  called  Comparative  Religion. 
This  vast  multiplicity,  how  sliall  it  be  put  into 
order?  Can  we  find  any  principle  of  such  order? 
The  mass  is  indeed  overwhelming,  and  seemingly 
chaotic;  many  writers  have  recently  attempted 
its  classification,  without  any  fully  satisfactory 
result,  though  certainly  progress  has  been  made. 
Then  the  information  on  the  subject  is  not  yet 
complete,  though  the  bulk  is  great.  And  in  the 
reports  of  investigators  there  is  considerable  dif- 
ference and  even  contradiction,  especially  about 
certain  Asiatic  Religions. 

A  common  division  of  Religion  is  into  natural 
and  revealed;  this,  however,  is  inadequate  on  a 
number  of  points.  Also  we  hear  of  natural  and 
ethical  religions,  those  which  seem  to  grow  from 
the  soul  of  the  whole  people,  and  those  which 
are  connected  with  the  name  of  an  individual 
founder,  such  as  Moses,  Zoroaster,  Buddha. 
This  distinction  certainly  has  validity  and  helps 
us  classify  the  forms  or  kinds  of  Religion  in 
their  relation  to   man.     But  man,  on  the  other 


442  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIOXS. 

hand,  relates  himself  to  religion  indifferent  ways, 
and  so  from  his  standpoint,  which  is  that  of  the 
self -active  Ego,  Religions  should  also  be  classi- 
fied. Here,  then,  w^e  have  two  methods  or  points 
of  view  for  the  classification  of  Religions,  which 
we  may  name  the  morphological  (moiyhe,  form) 
and  psychological  {j)syche,  soul  or  self). 

Still  more  common  than  either  of  these  is  the 
division  according  to  the  way  of  conceiving  God 
as  the  creative  center  or  self  of  the  universe.  In 
this  connection  we  hear  the  familiar  terms.  Pan- 
theism, Polytheism,  Monotheism.  The  main 
question  here  is.  How  does  this  given  Religion 
regard  God  — is  He  one,  many,  or  the  AH? 
That  is,  the  standpoint  now  is  theistic  and  inquires 
after  the  x\bsolute  Person.  For  instance,  Juda- 
ism and  Mahommedanism  are  both  monotheistic, 
hence  both  are  classified  together  under  the  pres- 
ent point  of  view.  Yet  on  the  side  of  form,  or 
morphologically,  they  are  very  different  Relig- 
ions. 

Here  then,  we  htive  three  different  methods  of 
classifying  Religions,  which  we  may  call  the 
morphological,  the  psychological,  and  the  the- 
ological. Each  has  its  distinct  worth,  indeed  each 
seems  to  be  about  as  valid  as  the  other.  Which 
shall  we  follow?  If  we  take  one  and  exclude  the 
rest,  our  classification  has  a  gap,  and  shows  in- 
completeness. The  fact  becomes  apparent  that 
these  three  methods  supplement  one  another,  and 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION,  443 

that  all  must  be  somehow  employed  in  anything 
like  a  complete  ordering  of  the  present  subject. 

A  deeper  inspection  soon  shows  that  they  are 
not  simply  three  separate  parts  of  one  whole,  but 
that  they  form  a  process  with  one  another,  a  psy- 
chical process  which  is  the  Psychosis.  They 
constitute,  in  fact,  just  the  process  of  the  multi- 
plicity of  Religions,  that  process  which  runs 
through  and  orders  fundamentally  all  religious 
diversity.  Hence  it  is  the  basic  principle  of  what 
we  call  Tlie  Muliireligious  Process,  the  one 
underlying  movement  in  the  manifoldness  of 
Religion,  the  latter  being  the  second  stage  in  the 
total  evolution  of  the  Religious  Institution. 

The  Multireligious  Process  will,  accordingly, 
show  three  ways  of  ordering  the  Religions  of  the 
world;  from  the  standpoint  of  the  objective 
form,  of  the  subjective  Self,  and  of  the  absolute 
Self.  These  we  shall  designate  as  the  morpho- 
logical, psychological,  and  theological  Orders. 

1.  The  Morphological  Order.  All  Religions 
have  in  common  the  God-consciousness,  with 
worship,  rites,  creed  and  priesthood,  which  have 
as  their  object  to  make  real  in  the  human  soul 
the  religious  Triad  —  God  as  positive  (Creator),  as 
negative  (Destroyer),  and  as  remedial  (Restorer). 
Very  imperfect  is  this  movement  in  primitive 
Religions,  almost  imperceptible  in  fact;  still  it 
is  present,  though  but  partially  and  implicitly, 
else  we  could  not  call  it  religious. 


444  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Many  forms  of  Religion  will  be  evolved  in  the 
passage  from  the  savage  state  up  to  the  civilized. 
Every  condition  of  human  consciousness  will 
show  a  tendency  to  manifest  itself  in  some  relig- 
ious form.  A  line  of  these  religious  forms  we 
behold  lying  between  barbarism  and  civilization, 
with  both  extremes  included.  This  morphologi- 
cal evolution  shows  man  in  his  struggle  with 
Nature  in  its  widest  sweep  and  his  rise  to  free- 
dom. Primarily  Nature  is  his  God  who  domi- 
nates him  immediately  and  capriciously,  j^et  leaves 
him  a  capricious  being.  Gradually  he  subjects 
Nature  without  (as  a  God)  and  within  (as 
his  Self) ;  thus  he  begins  to  have  an  ethical 
God  and  begins  to  be  an  ethical  Self,  in 
the  control  of  natural  impulse  and  passion. 
In  the  ethical  act  man  puts  down  N'aturis)n 
both  in  himself  and  in  the  God;  but  both 
may  be  still  held  fast  in  N^ativism,  in  the 
bonds  of  nation  and  race.  The  final  great  step 
is  the  Religion  which  calls  on  man  as  a  religious 
being  to  renounce  this  Nativism,  to  give  up  in  his 
Religion  his  nation  and  his  race,  making  the  same 
universal,  inclusive  of  all  humanity.  Nay,  the 
call  is  also  to  God  that  He  too  renounce  His 
Nativism,  that  He  be  no  longer  merely  a  tribal,  a 
national,  or  even  a  racial  God,  but  become  uni- 
versal. Then  He  is  free,  having  been  liberated 
from  the  bonds  of  Nature  in  its  widest  circuit ; 
then  man  too  is  free,  having  a  free  God,  whose 
"Will  is  to  will  Free-Will  in  a  free  world. 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  415 

Thus  the  morphological  Order  starts  with 
Nature-Religion,  in  which  the  man  (subjectively) 
and  the  God  (objectively)  are  dominated  by 
both  Naturism  and  Nativism.  Then  this  Order 
sets  forth  the  Ethical  Religions,  which  have  over- 
come the  naturistic  element  in  man  and  God,  but 
may  be  still  incumbered  with  the  nativistic  ele- 
ment. Thirdly,  there  rises  the  universal  Re- 
ligion, often  called  the  World -Religion,  which 
gives  up  both  the  naturistic  and  the  nativistic 
element,  and  seeks  to  unite  all  mankind  in  its  re- 
ligious fold.  Hence  this  last  is  truly  a  mission- 
ary Religion,  having  performed  the  deepest  act 
of  self-renunciation. 

It  should  be  noted  for  the  sake  of  the  reader 
who  always  wishes  to  keep  in  view  the  psycho- 
loo;ical  thread  which  unifies  these  three  religious 
forms  with  one  another  as  well  as  with  all  Insti- 
tutions, that  they  reveal  a  psychical  process  or 
Psychosis.  The  first  is  the  Religion  which 
immediately  dominates  the  individual  from  the 
side  of  external  Nature  in  both  its  shapes  of 
Naturism  and  Nativism.  The  second  is  the  Re- 
ligion which  separates  these  two  elements  of 
Nature,  putting  down  Naturism,  but  leaving 
Nativism  —  a  great  step  on  the  part  of  the  indi- 
vidual as  he  now  begins  his  inner  or  ethical  self- 
control  against  Nature.  The  third  is  the  Religion 
which  returns  to  the  first  and  suppresses  both  its 
elements,  namely    Naturism   and  Nativism,  and 


446  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

through  such  a  complete  mastery  over  all  exter- 
nal determination  of  Nature,  makes  itself  truly 
spiritual  and  free,  and  thereby  may  become 
universal. 

The  word  Nature  comes  from  the  same  root 
as  the  Latin  natus  (born,  physical  birth),  and 
suggests  the  generative  process  of  the  physical 
world.  The  terms  JSTafurism,  Nativism,  and 
Kation  are  allied  in  the  same  general  meaning. 
The  morphological  Order  shows  Religion  moving- 
out  of  this  natural  element,  by  which  it  is  at  first 
determined,  into  the  complete  subordination  of 
it,  passing  from  the  first  birth  (in  Nature)  to  the 
second  birth  (in  the  Spirit),  rising  from  genera- 
tion into  regeneration.  The  ascent  of  the  relig- 
ious form  is  graded  by  the  degree  in  which  it 
renounces  the  natural  Self  in  man  and  God,  and 
evolves  the  spiritual  Self  in  both  the  human  and 
divine  Ego. 

These  principles  as  well  as  their  movement  we 
shall  now  proceed  to  illustrate  briefly  with  some 
examples. 

(1)  Nature-Religions.  These  are  to  be  placed 
first  in  the  morphological  Order,  as  they  indi- 
cate the  primal  immediate  form  of  Religion 
derived  from  Nature,  and  are  both  naturistic  and 
nativistic.  The  Gods  are  in  the  main  powers  of 
Nature  which  are  deemed  spirits  that  must  be 
placated.  These  Gods  have  their  limits  —  they 
belong  to  the  family,  tribe,  nation  and  perchance 


THE  BE  LI  010  US  I.VSTITfTIoy.  447 

race ;  they  do  not  transcend  their  native  bound- 
aries, but  are  confined  exchisively  to  their  special 
set  of  people,  who  are  remotely  or  directly  con 
nected  by  blood.  The  physical  tie  of  kinship 
runs  through  all  Nature-Religion,  and  according 
a»  this  tie  of  blood  is  near  or  distant  (domestic, 
tribal,  national,  racial),  there  is  a  corresponding 
division  of  the  Gods.  Thus  the  man  is  divinely 
determined  by  Nature,  and  both  he  and  divinity 
are  in  the  lowest  state  of  freedom. 

Still  the  religious  Triad  is  present  and  at  work 
in  every  form  of  Nature-Religion.  There  is, 
first,  some  mighty  manifestation  of  Nature, 
which  is  the  God,  as  in  thunder,  or  the  volcano. 
Secondly,  the  destructive  character  of  this  power 
makes  it  an  evil  spirit,  or  the  God  in  anger. 
Then  follows,  thirdly,  placation  through  prayer, 
ritual,  priest,  in  all  of  which  lies  the  conception 
of  mediation,  of  a  placable  deity. 

There  are  many  stages  of  Nature-Religion. 
God  may  be  thing,  animal,  man ;  thus  we  have 
three  forms  which  have  been  called  Fetichism, 
Theriotheism,  Anthropotheism.  These  rise  in 
order  in  the  African,  Egyptian  and  Greek  Re- 
liijions.  In  Nature-Relio^ions  the  ethical  idea  is 
more  or  less  implicit,  but  starts  the  soul  on  its 
development  out  of  its  purely  natural  determina- 
tion. 

(2)  Ethical  Religions.  The  natural  man  be- 
gins to   subject  appetite,  passion,  desire  to  some 


448  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

higher  or  ideal  end,  which  is  the  good  in  one  of 
its  stages.  Here,  then,  is  the  separation  between 
real  and  ideal,  and  the  subordination  of  the 
former  has  commenced  in  the  human  soul.  In 
like  manner  the  conception  of  the  God  has  begun 
to  be  ethical,  to  Him  also  is  given  the  attribute 
good.  Moreover  ethical  Eeligions  have  an  indi- 
vidual founder,  a  prophet,  sage,  lawgiver,  whose 
name  is  known,  and  they  have  a  place  in  history. 
They  separate  the  Self,  the  individual,  from 
Nature's  mass,  and  start  him  in  self-determination. 
Thus  man  is  no  longer  subject  to  Naturism  but 
asserts  himself  in  his  own  self-control.  Still 
the  ethical  man  and  the  ethical  Relio-ion  belong: 
to  some  nation  or  race,  and  herein  do  not  and 
cannot  wholly  separate  themselves  from  the  limits 
which  Nature  has  placed  upon  them. 

The  Religions  of  Moses,  of  Zoroaster,  of  Con- 
fucius are  ethical,  but  still  nativistic;  they  have 
not  been  adopted  to  any  extent  outside  of  the 
nations  of  their  respective  founders.  Their 
deities  are  likewise  national  as  against  those  of 
other  peoples;  the  God  is  also  nativistic,  though 
no  lono;er  naturistic.  Moreover  all  these  Re- 
ligions  are  older  than  Christianity,  yet  they 
exist  to-day,  even  when  the  nation  (in  the  case 
of  the  Jew  and  the  Parsee)  has  no  political 
existence.  An  ethical  Religion  seems  to  be 
immortal. 

But    there    are   three   great   Religions    which 


THE  BELIGIOVS  IXSTITUTIODJ.  449 

began  as  ethical  and  uativistic,  but  which  have  in 
part  or  wholly  gotten  rid  of  Nativisni,  having 
transcended  in  certain  portions  of  their  followers 
this  last  bond  of  Nature. 

(3)  World-Religions.  This  term  can  be  prop- 
erly applied  to  three  Religions  —  Mahoiuedanism, 
Buddhism,  and  Christianity.  Of  course  the  term 
is  only  relatively  true;  strictly  speaking,  there 
can  be  but  one  World-Religion,  as  there  is  but 
one  World.  By  putting  the  three  together  and 
seeing  them  in  a  process  with  one  another,  we 
may  possibly  catch  some  glimpses  of  the  coming 
universal  World-Religion,  but  it  is  not  here  yet. 
This  term,  however,  is  not  to  be  thrown  aside,  as 
it  is  very  suggestive  and  stimulating,  indeed  pro- 
phetic and  hopeful  of  the  future  one  Religion, 
possibly  the  federation  of  Rehgions  with  their 
Constitution  and  Parliament. 

The  three  World-Religions,  existent  and  active 
at  the  present  time,  are  no  longer  confined  to  the 
people  or  race  from  which  they  sprang,  but  have 
shown  themselves  capable  of  adoption  by  other 
peoples  and  races,  who  have  therein  renounced 
their  own  native  Religion  and  Gods.  This  act, 
on  the  whole,  must  be  pronounced  to  be  the  most 
complete  act  of  self-renunciation  which  man  can 
perform  —  the  renunciation  not  simply  of  the  in- 
dividual Self  but  of  the  racial  Self,  both  human 
and  divine. 

This  is  the  primordial  self -subjection,  in  which 

29 


450  SOCIAL  INSTITVriONS. 

the  race  conquers  itself  as  a  whole,  and  not 
merely  individuals  of  it  here  and  there.  A  whole 
race  gives  up  its  native  religion  and  adopts  another, 
which  is  the  complete  surrender  of  Nativism, 
far  deeper  than  the  ethical  surrender  of  Naturism. 
For  it  can  transform  its  Eeligion  to  subordinating 
Nature  and  become  in  so  far  ethical,  which  is  the 
opposite  of  Nature.  But  to  change  Gods,  and 
to  take  a  different  race-religion  is  the  last 
abasement  of  the  natural  Self.  Yet  that  is  the 
eternal  process  kept  alive  by  Christendom  in 
reading  and  appropriating  the  Hebrew  Bible  and 
its  Relio;ion.  Hence  the  Christian  reader  can  get 
more  Religion  out  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  than 
the  Jewish  reader  possibly  can,  strange  as  the 
statement  may  seem.  For  the  Jew  naturally 
finds  the  God  of  his  people  in  that  Book,  which, 
therefore,  cultivates  his  Nativism,  his  racial  pride 
and  exclusiveness,  while  the  Christian  reader  has 
to  break  the  nativistic  bonds  of  the  Hebrew 
Jahveh,  and  make  him  a  universal  God,  to  whom 
he,  too,  though  of  a  different  race,  can  pray  and 
be  heard. 

(a)  Mahomedanism  we  place  first,  as  it  is  an 
adopted  Religion  for  several  races,  though  for 
Arabs  and  Semites  it  is  a  native  Religion.  Thus 
it  is  not  a  wholly  self-renouncing  Religion,  being- 
still  nativistic  and  asserting  itself  often  by  the 
sword.  From  this  standpoint  it  is  the  least 
emancipated  of  the  World-Religions,  the  least  free 
of  the  bonds  of  Nature. 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  451 

Yet  il  sh()\v8  wonderful  adaptability  for  the 
races  of  men  —  more  than  any  other  World- 
Religion,  especially  for  lower  races  —  Turanian, 
African,  Chinese.  There  are  also  Mahomedan 
Aryans,  though  the  Persian  changes  the  orthodox 
dogma  and  becomes  a  heretic. 

But  the  nativistic  strand  in  it  has  the  external 
violence  of  Nature  against  other  religions  and 
peoples.  Still  all,  wdien  Mahomedan,  are  de- 
clared to  be  equal  religioush';  politically  the 
strongest  takes  the  Caliphate,  as  the  Turk,  whose 
Nativism  and  even  Naturism  Mahomedanism  does 
not  extirpate. 

Also  it  is  a  missionary  religion,  even  if  limited, 
for  it  cannot  reach  the  European  mind,  though  it 
has  penetrated  by  conquest  into  Europe  several 
times.  Equally  certain  is  it  that  European  Chris- 
tianity has  not  been  able  to  convert  or  dispossess 
Mahomedanism.  Asiatic  Christianity,  largely 
Semitic,  went  over  to  Mahomet,  and  has  remained 
with  him,  as  he  too  was  a  Semite.  Thus  Mahom- 
edanism accentuates  Nativism  —  which  fact  shows 
itself  in  the  Turkish  rulers,  though  these  are  not 
Semitic. 

{b)  The  next  great  World-Eeligion  is  the 
Buddhistic,  which,  chiefly,  is  the  Religion  of  the 
Mongolian  race,  and  of  the  Malay  in  part,  though 
it  is  of  Aryan  origin.  Thus  the  Chinese  race  in 
this  matter  has  renounced  its  native  Religion  and 
taken  that  of  a  foreign  race.  Still,  only  in  part, 
since  Confucianism  and    Taoism  are  also  State 


452  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Religions  in  China,  both  of  which  are  sprung  of 
the  Chinese  race.  (Here  we  leave  out  of  the 
account  several  millions  of  Chinese  Mahonietlans 
and  not  a  few  Christians.)  Thus  Nativi.sin  in 
religion  has  not  been  wholly  renounced  by  China 
as  a  nation. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Buddhistic  religion 
itself  has  had  to  renounce  its  race,  being  expelled 
from  its  home  in  India  by  the  Brahmins.  There 
are  but  few  Aryans  comparatively  wdio  are  Bud- 
dhists, though  at  one  time  it  had  a  strong  hold 
on  the  Hindoos.  So  it  has  had  to  renounce 
Nativism  and  to  become  Mongolian  mainly,  or  at 
least  non-Aryan,  and,  of  course,  non-Semitic. 
Its  method  w^as  not  conquest,  but  conversion, 
hence  it  was  in  this  respect  different  from  Mahom- 
edanism.  But  its  local  limit  is  Eastern  Asia, 
and  its  racial  limit  is  mainlj^  Mongolian. 

(c)  The  third  World-Religion  is  the  Christian, 
whose  peculiarity  is  to  have  renounced  Nativism 
completely;  that  is,  the  Christian  Aryan  race  in 
Europe  has  taken  its  Religion  from  another 
race  without  reserve.  The  Mahomedan  Religion 
still  has  in  it  strono;  Nativism,  being  the  faith  of 
the  race  which  originated  it,  though  other  races 
have  made  the  renunciation  which  it  (the  Arabian 
race)  has  not.  The  Chinese  have  accepted 
Buddhism  but  partially,  and  so  have  but  partially 
renounced  Nativism,  though  the  Cingalese  may 
have  adopted  it  wholly. 


THE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  453 

Thus  the  West  Aryans  (in  Europe)  have  made 
the  most  complete  and  absolute  renunciation  of 
Nativism  in  Religion,  and  from  this  point  of  view 
have  done  the  universal  religious  act.  And  on 
the  other  hand  the  Christian  Relig-ion,  being  of 
Semitic  origin,  has  completely  renounced  its 
Nativism,  or  racial  element.  The  early  Christian 
element  in  Asia  was  largely  Semitic,  but  in  a  few 
centuries  after  the  Christian  era,  another  Semitic 
Religion  swallowed  it,  just  the  Semitic  or 
nativistic  portion  of  it  chiefly,  but  the  Aryan 
portion  in  Europe  Mahomedanism  could  not 
take,  it  never  could  submerge  the  Greek  Church 
in  Greece.  Christianity  thus  was  made  to  part 
with  its  original  nativistic  branch  in  Asia. 

Grading  these  World-Religions,  we  find  that 
Mahomedan  peoples  are  partly  nativistic  (Sem- 
ites), and  partly  not,  and  the  Mahomedan  Re- 
ligion has  in  part  renounced  Nativism  and  in  part 
not.  In  Buddhism  (China)  the  people  have 
partly  renounced  Nativism  in  Religion  yet  partly 
not.  Still  Buddhism  is  not  nativistic  and  thus 
is  more  self -renouncing  than  Mahomedanism. 
But  in  the  Christian  world  both  the  Race  and  the 
Religion  have  renounced  Nativism. 

Here  doubtless  lies  the  power  of  Christendom. 
It  fulfills  the  idea  of  Religion,  self-subjection  of 
the  native  Ego  to  the  universal  God,  which  is 
now  the  act  of  the  entire  Race.  Thus  Chris- 
tianity  marks  itself   off   from  all   other  Relig- 


454  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ions:  as  a  Race  it  has  renounced  and  can 
renounce  itself  —  not  an  individual,  or  a  com- 
munity or  even  a  State,  but  the  whole  Race. 
That,  as  we  have  seen,  is  the  Race's  fundamental 
religious  act  —  to  give  itself  up  to  God,  not  its 
own  God,  native  to  the  Race,  but  to  the  universal 
God  who  may  be  brought  to  it  by  a  different 
Race.  And  this  Religion  too,  or  this  God,  if 
you  please,  must  also  give  up  his  own  Race  and 
be  no  longer  a  racial  God. 

In  this  sense  of  double  renunciation  the  Chris- 
tian world  has  the  most  religious  Religion,  being 
that  of  a  Race  which  has  given  up  its  own  native 
God  (or  Gods)  for  the  God  of  another  Race,  who, 
however,  in  turn  has  renounced  His  Race,  and 
has  thus  made  Himself  universal.  The  move- 
ment of  Religion  is,  therefore,  to  get  rid  of  the 
blood-tie  which  is  the  essence  of  Nature-Relig- 
ions, and  to  establish  a  new  tie,  the  universally 
human  tie,  which  is  to  be  reached  through  and 
realized  by  the  double  or  indeed  treble  renuncia- 
tion—  by  renouncing  the  natural  tie  of  blood  and 
the  native  tie  of  Race,  and  adopting  a  self- 
renouncing  God. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Semitic  is  supposed  to 
be  the  creatively  religious  Race,  since  it  has 
orio-inated  two  of  the  three  World-Relimon-. 
And  it  has  never  had  a  rehgion  imposed  upon  it 
from  without,  at  least  not  in  historic  times. 
Thus  the    Semitic    Race,    Jewish,  Christian,  or 


TBE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  i55 

Arabian,  has  never  bad  to  renounce  the  native 
Rehg-ion  or  Nativism  in  Religion  —  which  fact 
has  its  great  significance  still  to-day.  And  the 
Semitic  God  has  never  had  to  renounce  his  own 
Race  and  go  over  to  another  Race,  and  there  be 
worshiped  as  a  self-renouncing  God  by  a  self- 
renouncing  Race.  Hence  the  Jews  are  of  all 
humanity  the  most  stubbornly  nativistic,  renounc- 
ing neither  their  racial  Self  nor  their  racial  God. 
The  Chinese  Buddhist  as  individual,  does  both, 
but  not  his  Race. 

These  three  World- Religions  are  at  present  in 
a  process,  we  might  say,  in  a  world-process  with 
one  another.  Their  localities  are  separate  in 
general,  they  are  arranged  almost  on  a  line,  start- 
ing from  the  Pacific  of  the  Eastern  Hemisphere, 
and  reaching  to  the  Pacific  of  the  Western. 
Buddhism  is  East  Asiatic,  Mahomedanism  is 
West  Asiatic  or  intermediate,  Christianity  is 
European  and  American.  As  already  indicated, 
they  all  have  been  great  missionary  Religions, 
converting  nations  and  races.  But  this  they  are 
no  longer,  not  one  of  them,  though  they  are  still 
active  among  foreign  peoples ;  at  most,  however, 
they  convert  individuals,  not  nations  or  races. 
Each  has  drawn  pretty  firmly  and  fixedly  its  re- 
lio-ious  limit  against  the  other. 

Neither  of  these  World-Religions  apparently  is 
going  to  convert  the  other  through  its  Religion. 
But  the  secular  Institutions  of  Christian  Europe, 


456  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  social  and  political  especially,  are  the  potent 
influences  of  the  new  conversion.  Hardly  the 
Oriental  Family  will  be  reached  at  present,  being 
the  genetic  Institution  and  closely  connected  with 
Religion.  But  Commerce,  the  Economic  Order 
is  taking  these  peoples  of  the  East  in  hand,  and  as 
it  has  to  be  secured  by  law,  it  is  necessarily  fol- 
lowed by  the  political  Institution. 

Thus  the  Orient  is  being  placed  under  what 
may  be  called  the  Christian  Secular  Institution, 
which  is  to  be  supported  and  vindicated  by  the 
law.  The  great  instance  is  the  English  adminis- 
tration of  India.  The  railroad,  telegraph,  news- 
paper, the  steamship,  inventions,  are  uniting  the 
Hindoo  peoples,  socializing  them  in  a  universal 
way  which  may  be  called  Christian.  It  is  said 
that  the  king  of  Ensfland  has  more  Mahomedan 
subjects  than  the  Sultan.  What  does  that  mean? 
A  training  to  the  English  political  Institution, 
which  leads  ultimately  to  freedom. 

The  federation  of  the  world  or  its  political  uni- 
fication will  probably  take  place  before  its  relig- 
ious unification.  So  it  was  in  the  old  Roman 
period.  The  East  has  to  be  trained  to  the  right 
of  the  individual — which  is  Occidental,  specially 
Anglo-Saxon — as  secured  by  Institutions. 
Neither  any  Oriental  Religion  nor  the  Occidental 
one,  which  is  of  Oriental  origin,  can  give  that. 
But  the  Aryan  Secular  Institution  can,  and  the 
present  is  its  epoch  for  universalizing  itself.     The 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  457 

time  has  come  when  the  Occident  must  requite 
the  Orient,  which  gave  to  it  the  Religious  Institu- 
tion and  the  God-consciousness,  with  the  gift  of 
its  Secular  Institution  which  is  to  make  valid 
Man-consciousness,  this  being  also  an  element  of 
the  Christian  Religion.  Apparently  the  Orien- 
tals are  not  going  to  take  directly  our  Religion, 
but  they  will  and  must  take  our  State  with  its  Law . 
Political  absolutism  is  even  there  to  vanish  first. 

Such,  then,  are  the  three  great  World-Relig- 
ions, all  of  which  are  brought  at  present  into 
mutual  contact  as  never  before,  and  are  begin- 
ning to  manifest  hints  of  a  process  with  one 
another,  which  has  a  great  future  before  it.  The 
political  trend  of  the  age  suggests  some  kind  of 
federal  bond,  which  may  bring  unity,  yet  secure 
freedom. 

The  thouo;ht  of  the  World-Religion  is  the  con- 
eluding  stage  of  the  morphological  Order,  which 
beffan  with  Nature-Relio;ion  as  its  first  form,  also 
called  of  animism,  which  is  a  kind  of  natural  Pan- 
theism, and  which  Waitz  defines  thus:  "  A  spirit 
dwells  in  any  sensible  object."  All  sensation  in 
the  savage  mind  easily  becomes  animistic;  he  is 
naturally  theistic  or  God-fearing,  which  tendency 
the  more  liberated  soul  condemns  as  superstitious. 
Such  liberation  is  first  found  in  an  ethical  Re- 
ligion, which  is  the  training  out  of  mere  Naturism, 
whereby  the  Ego  begins  to  know  itself  as  the 
determinant  of  Nature.     Finally  the  strength  of 


458  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  Self  reaches  the  point  where  it  can  cast  off 
Nativism  and  establish  approachingly  a  universal 
Religion.  The  Ego  now  knows  itself  as  the 
determining  factor  in  Religion,  and  will  proceed 
to  make  its  own  Order,  starting  from  itself  in  its 
primal  sensuous  activity. 

2.  The  PsyclioJogical  Order.  In  the  multi- 
religious  Process  a  new  ordering  comes  to  view 
Avhen  it  is  looked  at  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
Ego.  The  diversity  of  religion  is  seen  to  be  also 
psychological,  and  corresponds  to  diverse  stages 
of  the  mind.  There  is  an  evolution  of  the  Ego 
passing  from  the  lower  to  the  higher  forms 
of  God-consciousness,  from  sense-perception 
through  representation  to  thought. 

The  preceding  Order,  the  morphological,  may 
be  said  to  start  with  Nature,  and  to  show  religion 
rising  out  of  and  putting  down  the  natural  ele- 
ment throughout,  rising  out  of  and  then  putting 
down  in  succession  both  Naturism  and  Nativism. 
This  movement  orders  from  its  point  of  view  the 
grand  multiplicity  of  religions  as  they  have 
appeared  on  the  earth.  It  takes  their  forms  ob- 
jectively as  so  many  natural  phenomena,  and 
reveals  just  their  line  of  conflict  with  the  external 
determination  of  Nature. 

So  we  come  to  the  Ego,  the  subjective  principle, 
with  which  Nature,  in  the  preceding  movement, 
has  been  deeply  though  implicitly  in  conflict. 
For   the    essence  of  the  Ego  is  freedom,  and  it 


TEE  BELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  469 

seeks  gradually  to  throw  off  the  external  deter- 
mination of  Nature,  and  to  move  toward  a  free 
religion.  Accordingly  we  are  now  to  behold  the 
Ego  as  the  inner  or  subjective  determiner  of  the 
order  of  religions. 

The  human  Self  or  Ego  cannot  be,  cannot 
work,  without  involving  the  divine  Self,  the  ab- 
solute Ego.  The  act  of  projecting  myself  as  ob- 
ject, which  is  an  act  of  Avill,  finds  an  object 
already  existent  in  the  world,  which  I  jierceive  or 
know,  and  which  is  the  other  of  me,  completely 
external  to  my  Ego.  Now  what  is  this  knowing 
the  object?  I  have  to  re-enact  the  will  creating 
the  object,  in  order  to  know  it;  I  too  must  posit 
the  object  in  the  world  out  of  my  own  Self,  not 
producing  it  immediately,  but  reproducing  the 
divinely  creative  act  which  made  it  object  in  the 
first  place.  Every  act  of  my  knowing  the  exter- 
nal thing,  be  it  percept,  image  or  thought,  pre- 
supposes, yea  reproduces  the  will  creating  the 
same,  namely  the  world-creating  will,  God.  The 
primal  activity  of  my  self-conscious  Ego  is  only 
through  a  pre-existent  activity  of  the  Divine  Ego. 
The  movement  of  my  Self  in  knowing  the  world 
is  implicitly  the  movement  of  the  other  Self 
creating  the  world,  which  is  in  truth  just  that 
which  I  do  know.  Psychology,  therefore,  which 
is  the  science  of  the  human  Self,  is  properly 
supplemented  by  Theology,  the  science  of  the 
Divine  Self. 


460  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Hence  the  stages  of  my  knowing  the  objective 
world  are  the  stages  of  my  knowing  God.  Thus 
the  psychological  Order  can  determine  the  relig- 
ious Order.  My  Ego,  sensing  the  object,  senses 
also  God,  the  Will  making  the  object,  the  crea- 
tive Ego  whose  act  is  the  object.  And  this 
object  stimulates  me  through  the  senses  to  repro- 
duce itself  not  as  so  much  blank  matter  but  as 
the  very  process  of  its  creation. 

Also  I  separate  the  immediate  thing  of  nature 
from  its  creative  Ego,  as  I  separate  myself  from 
what  I  do  or  make.  Thus  I  have  an  image  of 
Hiin  which  I  as  Will  reproduce  in  an  object;  I 
make  the  maker,  in  fact  I  make  the  object  over 
in  the  image  of  its  maker.  Thus  the  outer 
image  of  God  appears,  often  called  the  idol ;  Art 
is  born,  the  child  of  Relisfion  whose  orig^inal  f  unc- 
tion  is  to  transform  the  object  so  that  it  reflects 
the  image  of  its  creator. 

Such  we  may  name  the  symbolic  act  of  the 
religious  mind.  The  Ego  puts  into  the  imme- 
diate thino-  of  Nature  a  divine  meanins;  —  the 
creative  Will  of  the  Universe.  This  is  the 
natural  symbolism  which  rises  in  every  soul  that 
sees.  The  artificial  sj'mbol  appears  when  the 
Ego  transforms  the  thing  of  nature,  puts  its  act 
of  Will  into  the  same,  makino;  an  imag-e  of  the 
universal  maker  or  Will. 

The  savage  and  the  child  stand  nearest  to  God, 
evervthino;  seen  or  heard  has  a  tendency  to  be- 


THE  RELIQIO  US  INS TITUTION  46 1 

come  Divine  Will.  Yet  this  is  the  lowest  God, 
or  lowest  phase  of  Him,  in  which  Nature  is  a 
series  of  special  acts  of  Divine  Will,  or  even 
special  deities  in  each  thing.  Science  is  to 
get  rid  of  this  view  and  introduce  a  new  utterance 
of  Nature  for  man  in  law,  which  is  itself  ulti- 
mately Divine  Will. 

The  Greek  world  made  the  God  in  the  form 
of  man,  employing  the  highest  shape  of  Nature. 
The  Orient  shaped  the  Gods  as  animals  or  com- 
mingled forms  of  man  and  animal ;  but  the  Greek 
humanizes  the  God,  throwing  away  the  lower 
animal,  and  using  the  human  body.  Asiatic 
mind  shows  the  struggle  of  the  Ego  to  get  rid  of 
Nature  and  come  to  itself.  Still  the  Greek 
statue  is  not  a  portrait,  but  has  in  it  a  reflection 
of  the  Universal  Ego,  the  creative  Ego  as  such, 
the  Divine  Self. 

It  is  plain  that  the  individual  Ego,  knowing 
the  object,  will  call  forth  three  grand  phases  of 
religion,  as  this  Ego  is  Sense-perception,  Imag- 
ination or  Thouoht.  The  chief  strujjgle  is  for 
the  last,  in  which  the  Ego  comes  to  see  itself  as 
universal  Ego,  or  to  recognize  God  as  Spirit. 
Such  is  the  Hebrew  movement.  Moses  is  the 
destroyer  of  idolatry  (golden  calf),  his  people 
must  make  the  transition  out  of  Egypt  into 
Judea,  or  out  of  the  imaginative  stage  of  religion 
into  the  spiritual  stage,  which  is  that  of  thought. 

The    Greeks,  though  the  beautiful  idolaters, 


462  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

had  also  a  struggle  of  the  same  kind,  especially 
uttered  by  their  philosophers.  The  Divine  must 
be  pure  spirit;  Athena  sprang  direct  from  the 
head  of  Zeus  without  going  throuh  Nature's 
process  of  birth  and  growth.  He  was  father, 
1  but  by  spiritual  creation,  and  she  was  Wisdom 
I  herself.  He  was,  however,  involved  in  the  pro- 
1  cess  of  nature,  so  the  Athenians  set  him  aside 
■  almost,  never  finishing  his  grand  temple  in  their 
city.  Athena  is  the  Mythus  of  Spirit  —  when 
she  is  worshiped,  it  is  the  process  of  mind  as 
i  divine. 

Thus  the  image  leads  up  to  the  thought  which 
created  it,  and  the  religion  of  the  image  passes 
over  into  the  religion  of  thought,  which  is  the 
creative  principle  of  the  human  Self  grasping 
the  absolute  Self  as  creative,  the  highest  form  of 
knowing  God  as  the  supreme  self-conscious  Per- 
son. To  behold  the  Divine  as  tlie  fundamental 
iprocess  in  everj'thing  is  the  human  Ego  re-enact 
iug:  the  Divine.  God  is  in  the  world  ever  creat- 
ing  the  world,  and  man  must  not  only  see  Him 
there  abstractly*,  but  unite  himself  with  His  cre- 
ative process  in  order  to  know  even  the  simplest 
object.  To  live  in  His  presence  it  is  no  longer 
necessary  (at  least  not  for  the  religion  of  thought) 
to  flee  from  the  world  and  to  work  the  soul  up  to 
a  special  form  of  vision  beatific  —  the  vision  of 
the  merest  external  thing  has  a  divine  counter- 
part if  beheld  creatively.     God  making  the  cos- 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUnON.  463 

nios  is  the  universal  self-conscious  Ego  in  its 
own  process  of  Self,  and  I  become  one  with  the 
Divine  Ego  when  I  enter  into  its  process  through 
thought  and  return  with  it  into  itself.  Thus  I  do 
not  lose  myself  in  ecstatic  vision,  but  realize  it 
fully,  completing  my  own  individuality  by  filling 
jt  with  the  universal  Self. 

On  the  other  hand  it  must  be  stated  that  as 
man  needs  God,  so  God  needs  man.  Without 
a  free  humanity  there  is  no  free  deity.  Finite 
man  knows  God,  and  God  knows  Himself  in  man, 
beholds  Himself  reflected  in  the  finite  Ego.  But 
this  finite  Ego  must  rise  to  the  conception  of  the 
universal  Ego  and  behold  the  same  in  its  process, 
before  God  can  truly  see  Himself  in  man's  Self. 
In  the  preceding  section  on  the  Morphology  of 
Religion  we  have  witnessed  a  gradual  ascent  from 
the  lowest  Nature-Religion  to  Christianity,  from 
unfreedom  to  freedom,  though  Christianity  itself 
manifests  various  stages  of  freedom.  What  does 
this  mean?  God  advances  into  a  consciousness 
of  himself  through  the  advance  of  man;  a  very 
imperfect  image  of  Himself  he  beholds  in  the 
African's  fetich  or  in  the  Calmuck's  praying- 
machine;  still  it  is  an  image  of  Him. 

The  conscious  Self  is  an  eternal  intuition  of 
Self,  both  as  human  and  divine.  This  is  the 
primal  Psychosis  Avhich,  beholding  its  own  pro- 
cess of  the  Self  as  man's  and  as  God's,  unites  the 
two    sides   in    one  act  which  is  vcrilv  the  act  of 


464  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Faith.  In  every  form  of  religion  there  must  be 
Faith,  this  immediate  consciousness  of  unity  be- 
tween the  human  and  divine  Ego.  As  I  am  self- 
conscious,  so  God  is  self-conscious,  and  these  two 
acts  of  self-consciousness  are  one  in  Faith,  which 
may  not  be  able  to  explain  itself  but  nevertheless 
asserts  itself.  As  already  often  declared,  the  human 
Eo;o  cannot  be  without  the  divine  Ego  as  its 
counterpart,  which,  however,  includes  it,  is  one 
with  it  in  the  process  of  Faith.  I  separate  God 
from  me  as  another  Self,  but  I  must  bring  Him 
back  to  me  and  have  Him  include  me  in  his  uni- 
versal Self,  which  act  is  still  mine,  and  I  include 
Him  likewise  in  the  process  of  my  Self,  becoming 
thereby  like  Him. 

Faith  is  founded  on  the  oneness  of  the  Self 
in  Man  and  God.  In  a  sense  Ave  may  regard 
it  as  deeper  than  knowledge  since  it  is  or  may  be 
unconscious,  requiring  no  conscious  act  of  will 
for  its  exercise.  Thus  Faith  cannot  help  itself, 
its  beinor  j^  one  with  the  Ego,  which  has  this 
immediate  unconscious  principle.  Mau  is  more 
than  he  knows,  he  is  before  he  knows,  he  is 
what  he  is  before  he  knows  what  he  is ;  he  is  the 
potential  unconscious  Self.  Into  him  is  born 
the  whole  world  of  institutions,  w^iich  he  is  to 
remake  in  order  to  possess  consciously. 

Accordingly  the  psychological  Order  will  show 
Religion  manifesting  itself  in  correspondence  with 
the  three  chief  stages  of  Psj'cholgy  —  Sense-per- 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  465 

ceptioii,  Representation  (or  Imagination),  and 
Thought.  In  consonance  with  this  division  we 
may  consider  these  stages  as  Sense-Religion, 
Image-Relioion  and  Thought-Religion. 

1.  Sense-Religion  takes  the  immediate  sensu- 
ous object  as  God  who  is  present  in  Nature  not 
as  a  power  or  cause  behind  it,  but  as  a  particu- 
lar and  in  this  particuhir  thing  here  and  now. 
This  phase  of  religious  consciousness  senses  God 
immediately  in  the  object  of  sense,  as  this  may 
by  chance  be  met  with  ;  there  is  no  universal 
side,  at  least,  not  explicitly  so ;  God  is  com- 
pletely particularized  in  the  material  thing  pres- 
ent, not  as  its  maker  but  as  the  thing  itself.  He 
is  not  the  beyond,  not  the  unseen;  this  primitive 
religion  can  as  yet  make  no  such  distinction. 

Still  it  has  the  faint  shadow  thereof,  a  far-off 
suggestion  of  God  as  spirit  distinct  from  Nature, 
since  Nature  herself  forces  this  distinction  upon 
the  senses.  The  unusual  occurrence,  as  the 
storm,  the  earthquake,  thunder,  breaking  in 
upon  the  customary  routine  of  the  primitive  man 
rouses  his  terror  at  another  power,  superior,  dif- 
ferent from  his  own.  This  power  he  must  placate 
by  incantations,  gestures,  and  sacrifice,  hence 
rises  worship,  which  takes  the  form  of  magic,  or 
the  immediate  control  over  natural  phenomena. 

Thus  we  discern  the  original  Triad  in  the  primi- 
tive Sense-Religion,  which  shows  in  its  process 
a  positive,  negative,  and  mediating  element. 
?.o 


466  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

The  primitive  sensuous  man  is  a  being  of  pleasure 
and  pain ;  when  the  latter  comes  to  him  from 
some  outside  object,  that  object  is  an  evil  power, 
a  destroyer  whom  he  must  conciliate.  The 
Sense-Religion  starts  with  the  primal  division  of 
sensation,  pleasure  and  pain,  which  division  must 
be  harmonized  by  a  form  of  religious  worship. 

The  Sense-Religions  correspond  quite  to  what 
we  have  already  designated  as  Nature-Religions, 
the  tAvo  kinds  are  two  different  ways  of  ordering 
the  same  general  phenomenon.  As  the  Sense- 
Religions  are  determined  by  the  particular  objects 
of  nature,  and  as  these  objects  are  of  many 
gradations  (as  mineral,  vegetable  and  animal), 
the  Sense-Relio^ions  show  a  certain  degree  and 
order  in  accord  with  natural  objects.  Of  this 
classification,  however,  we  cannot  here  take  any 
account. 

Sense-Religion  mediates  every  sensation  through 
God,  and  thus  has  its  profound  significance  for 
all  religion.  Sense-perception  has  this  original 
divine  substrate  in  its  process,  being  a  mental  re- 
creation of  the  sensed  object.  But  after  the 
percept  comes  the  image  which  also  has  its 
religion. 

2.  The  Religion  of  the  Image  is  based  on  the 
separation  which  is  made  by  the  Ego  in  the  stage 
of  Representation.  The  image  of  the  sensuous 
object  is  separated  and  evolved  from  its  implicit 
state  which  it  has  in  Sense-perception,  and  made 


THE  EELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  46  7 

explicit  before  the  mind.  (See  Psi/chologi/  coiff 
the  Psi/choais,  Chap.  Second  on  Eepresentation.  ) 
But  now,  in  the  religious  consciousness,  the 
image  of  God,  of  the  All-Power,  which  was  im- 
plicit in  the  Sense-Religion,  is  separated  and  pro- 
jected into  an  independent  form  which  may  be 
internal  as  well  as  external.  Primarily  this  All- 
Power  has  to  be  reproduced  in  and  by  the  Ego, 
and  thus  spiritualized,  becoming  an  image  or 
concept,  and  being  no  longer  a  sensuous  object, 
a  fetich. 

Herewith  springs  forth  the  Imagination  in  a 
marvelous  play  of  forms,  being  freed  from  its 
subjection  to  the  material  thing.  Ariel  is  liber- 
ated, no  longer  pegged  up  in  wooden  log,  and  he 
flies  to  the  ends  of  the  Earth  and  especially  to 
the  Heavens  above.  This  is  the  stage  in  w^hich 
Mythology  flourishes.  The  deity  is  now  sepa- 
rated from  the  storm  and  is  imaged  as  the  power 
in  it  or  behind  it ;  but  the  Mythus  causes  him  to 
step  forth  from  out  of  the  cloud  and  to  show 
himself  in  his  own  form  and  to  vindicate  his 
(li\inc  right  by  his  deeds.  Ever}'  people  has, 
must  have  some  kind  of  a  ^Nl^'thology,  which  mani- 
fests an  essential  stage  of  religion  and  of  man 
himself. 

All  civilized  religions  are  more  or  less  in  the 
imaginative  stage  ;  in  order  to  be  civilized  a  people 
must  be  able  to  free  its  universal  principle  from 
material  nature,  and  to  put  the  same  into  its  own 


468  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

form,  in  word  and  act.  The  Hindoo  religion 
has  been  called  expressly  the  religion  of  the 
Imagination,  having  on  the  one  hand  its  abstract 
and  universal  idea  as  Brahm,  and  on  the  other 
the  wildest  extravagance  of  fanciful  figuration  of 
the  Gods. 

It  is  in  this  stage  that  the  human  Ego  makes 
the  distinction,  very  important  in  man's  advance- 
ment, between  the  transitory  and  the  eternal,  the 
appearance  and  the  essence,  the  finite  and  the 
infinite.  This  distinction  is  never  to  be  lost  in 
any  religion,  though  it  takes  many  forms.  For 
instance,  in  the  Hindoo  religion  we  may  say  that 
the  finite  (or  mortal)  makes  itself  infinite  (by 
its  own  self-negation  or  hy  mortification  of  the 
flesh  ) .  Contrariwise  we  may  say  that  in  the  Chris- 
tian religion,  the  infinite  (God)  makes  itself  finite 
(in  the  son).  The  same  distinction  is  found 
in  the  known  and  unknown,  the  latter  reaching 
even  the  unknowable,  at  Avhich  point  it  contra- 
dicts itself. 

Here  also  is  the  sphere  of  the  religious  sym- 
bol, which  has  inherently  the  separation  into 
form  and  meanino^.  "When  the  religious  mind 
asks,  what  does  this  rite,  emblem,  etc.,  mean,  it 
is  calling  for  thouoht,  which  is  the  next  stage. 

3.  The  Religion  of  Thought  has  its  fountain  in 
the  Thought  of  the  absolute  Ego.  The  human 
Ego  is  Thought,  the  absolute  Ego  is  Thought, 
and    the    two    sides    are   unified    ultimately    by 


THE  EELIQIOUS  INISTITUTION.  469 

Thought,  which  is  the  common  creative  prin- 
ciple of  both. 

When  in  my  thinking  ana  Knowing  I  think  and 
know  the  universal  spirit  as  the  genetic  source  of 
all  things,  I  have  to  re-create  the  process  of 
creation,  and! rise  from  world-consciousness  (the 
finite)  to  God-consciousness  (infinite).  My 
thought  of  the  object  finds  the  process  of  the 
Ego  in  the  object,  my  thought  of  God  finds  the 
process  of  tlie  Ego  to  be  His,  which  is  the  abso- 
lute process.  Thought,  therefore,  will  take  the 
undetermined  or  the  infinite  or  even  the  unknown 
of  the  previous  imaginative  stage,  and  Avill  unfold 
within  it  the  process  of  the  absolute  Self. 

On  the  other  hand,  God  as  Thought  must 
finitize  himself  in  order  to  know  himself,  in 
order  to  be  a  self-conscious  Ego.  Religious 
Thought  has  as  its  supreme  content  God's  self- 
conscious  knowing,  which  is  the  absolute  process 
of  the  divine  Ego.  This  is  the  divine  Psychosis, 
the  Ego  which  separates  itself  within  itself  and 
becomes  finite  in  order  thereby  to  return  to  itself 
as  self -knowing.  The  content  of  Religion  is  the 
absolute  spirit  knowing  itself  through  the  medi- 
ation of  the  finite  spirit  which  is  thus  an  inherent 
element  of  God's  own  self,  I  am  to  know  God, 
but  God  has  to  know  me  in  order  to  know  Himself. 

The  Relitrion  of  Thouj^ht  has  an  ethical  content 
on  the  side  of  the  Will.  God  is  the  Good,  Avills 
the  Good,  which  is  ultimate! v  freedom,  or  more 


470  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

explicitly,  the  Free-Will  which  wills  Free- Will. 
We  have  already  stated  that  ethical  religions  have 
generally  had  an  individual  founder  who  is  known 
and  named,  as  Confucius,  Buddha,  Zoroaster, 
Christ.  For  the  man  must  appear  who  has  risen 
to  willinof  the  Good  and  realizing  the  same  in  his 
personal  conduct  and  life.  Thus  he  may  will  a 
higher  Good  than  even  the  Gods  of  his  country 
and  of  his  people,  with  whom  he  collides  at  first, 
till  they  accept  him  or  his  Good.  Such  is  the 
Reformer  who  may  be  more  godlike  than  the 
Gods,  and  who  is  often,  therefore,  canonized  or 
even  deified.  Socrates  is  a  kind  of  exception, 
though  he  was  more  divine  than  the  divinities  'of 
his  own  age ;  he  probably  more  than  any  other 
mortal,  founded  the  Ethical  as  it  is  in  itself, 
without  its  religious  form,  in  its  pure  abstraction. 
In  him  we  may  see  that  the  Religion  of  Thought 
has  become  Thought  itself.  So  he  is  the  Philos- 
opher, not  the  Prophet,  Saint,  or  God. 

Such  is  briefly  the  psychological  Order 
manifesting  itself  in  three  religious  stages  — 
Sense-Religions,  Image-Religions,  and  Thought- 
Religions.  Yet  every  religion  has  something 
of  all  three,  though  its  dominating  trait  assigns 
it  to  one  of  the  three.  Man  has  the  round — 
God-fearing,  God-loving,  God-knowing — though 
he  have  more  of  this  or  of  that  and  less  of  the 
rest.  Nor  must  w^e  leave  out  the  negative  ele- 
ment inherent  in  the  Ego  as  well  as  in  all  Evolu- 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  471 

tion.  The  advance  of  religion  depends  on 
heresy.  Both  the  heretic  and  the  heresj^-hunter 
belong  in  the  grand  process ;  Christ  himself  was 
just  about  the  greatest  of  all  heresiarchs. 

The  Religion  of  Thought  grasps  God  as 
Thought,  which  is  the  divinely  creative  principle 
of  the  Universe.  Here,  then,  we  come  to  the 
Divine  Ego  or  God  as  world-maker ;  the  religious 
mind  seeks  to  behold  Him  and  to  formulate  Him 
as  the  universal  generative  principle  of  all 
things.  This  gives  a  new  Order  of  religions, 
the  theolooical  or  theistic,  which  throuoh 
Thought  passes  out  of  the  Subjective  Ego  as 
determiner  to  the  objective  Ego  as  determiner,  of 
religion.     This  is  what  we  are  to  look  at  next. 

3.  The  Theological  Order.  The  absolute  Self 
now  is  seen  manifesting  itself  in  all  relioions, 
which  gives  the  various  systems  of  Theism. 
In  the  multireligious  Process  this  is  the  third 
stage,  since  it  returns  in  a  manner  to  the  mor- 
phological Order,  yet  with  a  difference.  Mor- 
phology gives  the  order  of  Nature,  beginning 
with  Nature-Religion  and  tracing  its  movement 
upwards  till  it  vanishes  into  the  World-Religion 
through  the  Ethical.  But  the  theolooical  Order 
traces  God  in  Nature,  giving  God-forms  creative 
of  Nature  rather  than  the  Nature-forms  creative 
of  God.  Thus  it  too  is  a  kind  of  Morphology 
whose  shapes  show  God  determining  Nature  and 
not  Nature  determinino^  God.     The  intermediate 


472  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

step  is  man,  the  human  Ego  (m  the  psychological 
Order),  who  is  first  determined  by  Nature  to  de- 
termine God,  then  determines  Him  through  the 
subjective  Self,  which  finally  determines  the  Self 
as  objective,  universal,  as  the  creative  deity. 

The  theological  Order  (or  Order  of  the  Gods) 
will  reveal  itself  in  three  movements,  that  of 
Natural  Theism  showing  the  immediate  forms  of 
the  God-consciousness,  that  of  Polytheism  show- 
ing their  multiplicity,  that  of  Christendom  show- 
ing their  unity. 

A.  The  Theistic  Movement.  As  is  usual  in  the 
beginning,  all  religions  are  implicit,  potential,  not 
yet  differentiated.  In  the  primitive  Theism  of 
the  savage  and  of  the  lower  races  we  can  always 
observe  phases  of  the  three  main  forms  of  God- 
consciousness :  Monotheism,  Pantheism,  and 
Polytheism.  They  are  not  sharply  divided,  but 
are  all  present,  yet  in  a  kind  of  process  with  one 
another. 

(1)  The  primal  religious  act  of  the  human 
Ego  is  monotheistic,  must  be  so,  as  it  is  the  rela- 
tion of  this  one  Person  to  an  absolute  Person. 
Hence  it  may  be  said  that  the  primal  religion  of 
man  is  Monotheism,  by  a  psychological  necessity, 
as  by  a  physical  necessity  the  primal  domestic 
relation  is  monogamic.  This  of  course  does  not 
mean  that  God  revealed  to  man  from  the  outside 
the  principle  of  Monotheism  somewhere  in  the 
beginning  of  things;  man  has  to  be  ready  for 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  473 

sucn  a  revelation  before  he  can  receive  it,  unless 
God  made  him  ready  too.  But  in  the  humblest 
act  of  worship  the  human  being  has  to  call  forth 
or  reproduce  the  deity  who  is  to  aid  him. 

(2.)  Coupled  with  this  primordial  monotheis- 
tic act  is  the  pantheistic  view  in  its  simplest  form. 
All  the  visible  world  has  its  invisible  counterpart ; 
to  an  outer  material  manifestation  there  is  an 
inner  immaterial  soul-life.  The  plant,  the  ani- 
mal, the  lifeless  object,  have  souls,  so  that 
there  is  the  world  of  animal-souls,  plant-souls, 
and  object-souls.  Such  was  and  is  the  twofold- 
ness  in  all  things  according  to  the  primitive 
man,  who  holds  this  doctrine  which  has  become 
widely  known  in  modern  science  under  the 
name  of  animism.  Thus  arises  the  spirit-world 
which  is  the  controller  of  the  sense-world. 

Again  we  see  that  man  has  projected  his 
own  double  nature,  body  and  soul,  into  the  ex- 
ternal Avorld.  This  Natural  Pantheism  is  not 
so  much  a  worship  as  a  kind  of  doctrine  or 
creed ;  it  has  been  called  the  philosophy  of  the 
savage,  but  it  is  rather  his  theology,  his  science 
of  the  Gods.  A  deity  is  in  the  brook,  in  the 
tree,  in  the  animal ;  also  in  the  storm,  in  the  pes- 
tilence, in  the  destructive  energies  of  nature, 
which  must  somehow  be  appeased.  But  this 
requires  the  relation  of  the  individual  man  to  the 
individual  spirit,  and  so  we  have  again  a  mono- 
theistic relation. 


474  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

(3.)  This  stage  we  may  name  Henotheism, 
employing  a  term  which  has  come  into  use  through 
Max  Miiller.  It  is  the  primal  monotheistic  act 
already  mentioned,  yet  something  more.  The 
religious  Eofo  moves  out  of  its  theoretic  relation 
in  simple  Pantheism  and  selects  it  deity,  to  whom 
this  offering  or  worship  is  due.  Out  of  the  mul- 
tiplicity of  Nature  and  its  spirits,  the  one  most 
favorable  or  powerful  is  the  object  of  special 
adoration. 

But,  with  the  choice  of  the  one,  many  are 
excluded,  yet  implied  and  indeed  existent.  Thus 
along  with  Henotheism  there  nuist  soon  appear 
Polytheism  as  the  counterpart.  Also  a  new  de- 
velopment begins :  what  is  the  relation  between 
one  and  many  deities?  And  what  is  the  order  of 
the  many  among  one  another? 

Polytheism  thus  begins  to  organize  itself,  to 
form  a  system ;  the  confused  mass  of  deities  must 
bring  into  itself  some  kind  of  precedence,  where- 
with we  witness  a  new  stao^e  of  Reliorion. 

B.  The  Polytheistic  Movement.  We  do  not 
treat  of  Polytheism  merely,  but  of  Polytheism  in 
a  process.  For  it  never  is  a  crystallized  sj'stem 
of  many  deities,  but  is  in  a  movement  with  all  and 
one,  with  Pantheism  and  Monotheism,  though 
the  stress  be  upon  the  multiplicity  of  Gods. 
The  Vedic  Hvmns  of  the  old  Arvans  are  poly- 
theistic, yet  they  are  also  monotheistic  and  pan- 
theistic, so  that  investigators  are  much  puzzled 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  475 

under  which  head  to  classify  them .  As  if  it  were 
necessary  to  fix  them  absolutely  into  one  class ! 
In  like  manner  Brahmanism  has  an  enormous 
number  of  deities  but  also  claims  to  have  only  one 
God. 

Thus  Monotheism  is  implicit  and  fermenting  in 
all  Polytheism,  which  may  be  regarded  as  a  grand 
discipline  through  which  Theism  has  to  pass  in 
order  to  reach  its  highest  form  in  the  com})lete 
religion.  Probably  all  religions,  not  excepting 
the  Hebrew,  has  had  to  go  through  its  polytheis- 
tic stage,  which  seems  to  do  for  Theism  what 
Polygamy  does  for  the  Family,  being  the  training 
into  Monogamy.  Man,  in  the  development  of  his 
God-consciousness,  is  to  try  many  Gods  and  to 
organize  them  into  a  family  or  home  of  divinities, 
which  must  ultimately  be  monotheistic.  This 
organization  of  many  divine  persons,  necessarily 
conflicting,  is  the  great  polytheistic  discipline  for 
man,  who  must  at  last  unify  them. 

(1.)  Polytheism  proper  has  its  most  famous 
representative  in  the  old  Greek  religion  and  has 
received  an  imperishable  portrayal  in  the  poems 
of  Homer.  He  has  the  upper  and  lower  world, 
of  Gods  and  men,  as  in  animism,  but  makes  the 
Gods  the  bearers  of  spiritual  principles  which 
are  in  conflict  below  on  earth.  The  Homeric 
poems  are  primarily  religious  documents,  which 
are  among  the  most  precious  of  their  kind ;  their 
literary  value  is  properly  sccondiuy.     The  signi- 


476  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

licance  as  well  as  the  limitation  of  Polytheism  is 
seen  in  Homer,  who  disciplines  his  reader  out  of 
it,  by  making  him  pass  vicariously  through  it. 

For  Homer  has  decided  elements  of  Monothe- 
ism, which  is  seen  in  the  supremacy  of  Zeus 
(Iliad,  Book  VHI).  His  conflict  among  the 
Gods  means  their  dissolution.  Other  polytheistic 
systems  have  also  left  their  impress  in  poetry, 
for  example,  the  Vedic.  Then  there  is  the  dual 
system  —  Persian.  The  Northern  mythology  is 
also  polytheistic.  In  Christian  legend  something 
of  a  polytheistic  undercurrent  remains  in  the 
belief  in  angels,  demons,  etc.,  as  well  as  in 
deeper  matters  to  be  considered  later. 

(2.)  Polytheism  and  Pantheism  unite  in  a  pro- 
cess. It  is  manifest  that  Polytheism  refuses  to 
exist  by  itself,  and  so  is  always  calling  up  a  pro- 
cess with  the  other  forms  of  Theism.  We  may 
now  consider  it  briefly  in  its  relations  with  Pan- 
theism, the  negative  Pantheism  whose  essence  is 
the  supreme  All  which  swallows  everything,  that 
is,  every  form  of  individuality.  We  must  note, 
however,  that  this  Pantheism  is  very  diiferent 
from  the  naive  Greek  Pantheism  of  Nature  which 
put  a  deity  into  every  object.  This  Pantheism 
is  the  opposite  of  multiplicity  and  linitude,  hence 
quite  the  other  side  of  Polytheism  which  it  seems 
to  devour,  or  at  least  overrule. 

Even  in  polytheistic  Homer  a  negative  pan- 
theistic   element  often   peeps  out   in  the  power 


THE  RELIGIOUS  I?iSTITVTION.  477 

of  Fate,  quite  impersonal  and  formless,  who 
is  at  times  said  to  be  above  Zeus  and  all  the 
Gods.  In  later  Greek  literature  this  element  of 
Fate  becomes  more  pronounced,  and  in  the 
course  of  history  does  actually  overthrow  the 
Greek  Pantheon. 

The  most  striking  instance  of  this  neofative 
Pantheism  in  its  process  with  Polytheism  is  seen 
in  Buddhism  in  its  conflict  with  Brahmanism. 

The  most  famous  example  of  a  Pantheistic 
system  in  Europe  is  that  of  Spinoza,  whose 
doctrine  of  Substance  is  really  directed  against 
the  Christian  Trinity  as  polytheistic. 

Pantheism  runs  through  the  Christian  Church 
from  the  beginning,  specially  in  the  Mystics. 
Anselm's  ontological  proof  of  God  is  charged 
by  Abelard  with  being  pantheistic.  Many  mod- 
ern thinkers  have  been  declared  to  be  more  or 
less  deeply  tinged  with  Pantheism,  as  Schelling, 
Hegel,  Cousin,  even  Froebel,  and  very  decidedly 
Goethe  in  one  period  of  his  life. 

Pantheism  in  its  complete  negative  manifesta- 
tion (as  in  Buddhism)  obliterates  God  as  Person, 
as  Ego.  It  sweeps  out  all  Polytheism,  but  there 
remains  merely  the  destructive  might  of  undoing 
the  Gods.  But  this  absolute  negative  Power  is 
next  conceived  as  a  God,  indeed  the  one  God  de- 
stroying many  Gods  —  Monotheism. 

(3.)  Polytheism  and  Monotheism  thus  have  a 
process  ^Yjth  each  other.     Already  we  have  noted 


47S  SOCIAL  INSl'ITUTIONS. 

a  monotheistic  element  in  all  S3'3tems  of  Poly- 
theism ;  indeed  this  could  hardly  systematize  it- 
self without  some  conception  of  a  supreme  God 
(like  Zeus)  over  the  other  Gods,  who  are  present 
in  the  Pantheon.  But  now  Monotheism  becomes 
strict  and  exclusive,  the  one  God  does  not  toler- 
ate other  Gods  even  in  a  subordinate  relation. 
Here  we  have  a  Monotheism  which  has  in  it  an 
intensely  destructive  principle,  as  it  annihilates 
all  other  Gods.  The  negative  element  in  Pan- 
theism the  one  God  adopts  toward  the  rest  of  the 
divine  family,  and  just  in  this  way  he  asserts  his 
personality,  being  armed  with  the  destructive 
might  which  has  been  noted  as  pantheistic. 

This  is,  in  general,  Oriental  or  Semitic  Mono- 
theism, of  which  we  have  a  very  striking  record 
in  three  Bibles,  all  of  them  Semitic  in  origin. 

(a).  The  first  and  the  most  intense  monotheist 
is  the  Hebrew.  Yet  Jahveh,  his  one  deity,  was 
an  evolution  out  of  Polytheism,  with  which  he 
had  to  keep  up  a  continual  struggle.  The  danger 
of  a  polytheistic  relapse  seems  to  have  been  never 
absent  from  the  children  of  Israel. 

(6).  The  early  Christian  religion,  also  Hebrew, 
certainly  modified  this  intense  and  bitterly  nega- 
tive Monotheism  b}^  a  reform  which  was  in  the 
nature  of  a  re-action  from  nativism  and  exclusive- 
ness.  The  Trinity  contains  a  polytheistic  as  well 
as  an  Aryan  element,  wherein  lie  its  humanity 
and  universalitv. 


THE  llELIOIOUS  INSTITUTION.  479 

(c).  Mahomedanism  in  turn  was  a  Semitic 
re-action  against  Christianity,  which  re-action  re- 
asserted  the  one  God  against  the  triune  God,  and 
re-affirmed  Semitic  Nativism  in  religion.  The 
appeal  had  such  force,  internal  as  well  as  external, 
that  Semitic  Christianity  became  substantially 
non-existent.  The  result  was  the  grand  schism 
or  separation  in  Christendom,  the  separation  of 
Europe  from  Asia,  of  Aryan  from  Semite,  of 
Occidental  from  Oriental  Monotheism.  Here- 
with has  developed  an  entirely  new  movement, 
to  which  w^e  next  pass. 

C.  The  Monotheistic  Movement  (Christian). 
We  are  now  to  glance  at  the  religion  whose  God- 
consciousness  unfolds  the  triune  God  to  His 
supreme  dignity  and  authority  in  the  world. 
This  religion  is  monotheistic,  yet  not  negatively, 
exclusively  so ;  Deity  does  not  destroy  other 
deities  of  the  divine  family,  but,  so  to  speak, 
embraces  them  within  Himself,  in  His  own  essence 
and  movement.  The  fatherhood  of  God  is  no 
longer  an  abstract  attribute,  but  a  reality  in  the 
faith  of  mankind,  being  realized  in  a  Son,  who  is 
also  human.  Hence  Christian  Monotheism  is 
the  completed  theistic  process,  w^hich  includes 
within  itself  both  the  unity  and  multiplicity  of 
deities,  being  the  one,  many,  and  all,  in  their 
eternal  movement. 

The  working-out  of  this  movement  is  found  in 
the  history  of  the  Christian  Church,  particularly 


480  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

of  its  central  doctrine,  the  Trinity,  which  has 
been  the  source  of  war,  persecution  and  much 
theological  rancour.  But  it  still  maintains  its 
place ;  in  fact,  it  is  stronger  than  ever  in  its  de- 
veloped form,  and  is  manifestly  going  to  secular- 
ize itself,  that  is,  to  show  itself  the  basic  fact  of 
secular  science  as  well  as  of  religion. 

We  cannot  think  of  griving  here  even  a  meager 
outline  of  Church  History.  The  following  points, 
however,  may  be  noted :  — 

1.  The  primitive  Church  is  the  Church  organ- 
izing itself  but  not  yet  institutionalized.  The 
doctrine  of  the  triune  God  is  announced  in  the 
New  Testament  by  Christ  himself  and  developed 
later  by  the  Greek  theologians,  particularl}^  those 
of  Alexandria,  till  it  becomes  the  fundamental 
dogma  of  the  Christian  Church. 

2.  The  Church  is  made  completely  institutional 
in  the  West  by  the  Roman  bishops,  through  the 
Roman  power  of  organization  and  the  Roman 
Law,  though  Constantine  began  this  work.  The 
grand  fact  now  is  that  the  Religious  Institution, 
in  the  highest  form  it  has  ever  attained,  arose  in 
the  world  as  the  Medieval  Christian  Church. 
But  abuses  crept  into  it,  the  chief  abuse  being 
that  it  did  not  adequately  secure  the  new  free- 
dom which  had  dawned  on  the  world,  especially 
among  the  Teutonic  peoples  of  Northern  Europe. 
Hence  a  fresh  schism  and  separation,  which 
sought,  however,  to  be  a  return  to  the  primitive 


THE  BELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  481 

Church  out  of  the  medieval  ecclesiastical  organi- 
zation. 

3.  This  is  Protestantism,  which  with  its  allied 
Humanism,  is  a  going  back  to  ancient  Judea, 
Greece,  and  Rome  in  religion,  in  philosophy  and 
in  culture.  Protestantism,  therefore,  is  in  its 
origin  anti-institutional  as  regards  the  Religious 
Institution.  This  characteristic  it  still  retains, 
being  an  element  of  its  very  genesis ;  the  result 
is,  it  has  never  been  able  to  unite  itself  into  a 
Religious  Institution,  and  probably  never  will. 
As  it  smote  the  medieval  Religious  Institution 
into  parts,  so  it  cleaves  itself  into  manifold  divi- 
sions. It  has  brought  freedom,  but  not  institu- 
tional freedom.  Hence  there  is  the  call  •for  the 
coming  Church  which  shall  be  as  free  as  the 
Protestant  and  as  institutional  as  the  medieval 
Church. 

So  far  the  monotheistic  Movement  of  Chris- 
tianity has  proceeded,  bringing  itself  down  to  the 
present  time.  It  still  retains  as  its  central  doc- 
trine the  triune  God,  and  thus  keeps  alive  and 
active  the  God-consciousness  in  man  through  the 
very  process  of  the  Divine  Self  in  the  human 
soul.  Herewith  we  have  attained  the  final  stage 
of  what  we  called  the  theological  Order  in  the 
Religious  Institution. 

The  special  meaning  of  the  three  terms   here 
employed  —  morphological,    psychological,     and 
theological — has  been  already  indicated.     Still 
31 


482  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

it  should  be  observed  that  each  of  the  three  terms 
has  a  "svider  significance  which  embraces  the  other 
two.  For  instance,  we  may  call  Mahomedan- 
ism  as  well  as  Nature-Religion  a  form  of  Religion, 
hence  both  may  be  classed  under  Morphology. 
Then  Psveholo^v  gives  the  inherent  movement  in 
all  three  Orders,  though  it  organizes  the  second 
(the  psychological  Order)  in  a  special  sense.  Fi- 
nally, Theology  may  be  said  to  embrace  not  only 
the  Order  which  is  here  given  to  it,  but  also  the 
other  two.  Thus  each  term  does  not  isolate  it- 
self from  the  rest,  but  takes  them  up  into  itself, 
so  that  they  are  completely  interrelated  in  mean- 
ing. Metaphorically  we  can  also  say  that  these 
three  Orders  correspond  to  the  three  ways  of 
seeing — outward,  inward,  upward. 

At  this  point,  too,  another  division  of  our  sub- 
ject is  brought  to  a  conclusion — that  which  has 
been  named  the  Multireligious  Process,  which  is 
the  second  stage  in  the  complete  Evolution  of  the 
Relioious  Institution.  This  is  the  most  diversi- 
fiedand  complicated  stage,  whose  varied  phenom- 
ena we  have  sought  to  bring  into  psychical  unity 
in  the  preceding  exposition.  The  outcome  of 
this  Process  we  have  seen  in  the  present  separa- 
tions and  sects  of  the  Christian  world,  which  has 
in  it,  however,  the  struggle  toward  a  new  order 
of  things. 

ril.  The  Omnireligious  Process.  In  strict 
speech  this  would  mean  the  Process  of  all  Relig- 


THE  BELIGIOUS  IXSTITUTION.  4^3 

ions  into  one  universal  Religion  as  explicit. 
Already  we  found  in  the  unireligious  Process  the 
one  original  principle  of  the  religious  movement 
of  mankind  unfolding  into  the  multiplicity  of 
Religions.  But  the  omnireligious  Process  seeks 
to  find  the  one  Religion,  not  as  implicit  but  as 
actual,  which  can  embrace  or  unify  all  others  in 
their  essence.  It  pre-supposes  the  multiplicity 
of  Religions,  which  it  is  to  unite  in  their  common 
Process.  The  unireligious  Process  was  the  germ 
or  creative  cell  of  all  Religions,  being  the  primal 
religious  Triad ;  but  the  omnireligious  Process  is 
to  show  the  one  completed  Religion;  it  is  unire- 
ligious, also,  not  as  implicit  but  as  explicit,  not 
as  ideal  but  as  real,  being  actualized  in  the  univer- 
sal Religious  Institution. 

It  need  hardly  be  said  that  no  such  Institution 
exists  at  present.  Merely  an  aspiration  it  is 
which  religious  souls  scattered  over  the  world  are 
hoping  and  helping  to  realize  in  some  distant 
future.  The  thousand  forms  of  religion  are  in 
a  state  of  evolution  with  one  another,  and  are 
travailing  to  bring  forth  what  they  all  have  in 
common.  In  this  regard  it  must  be  confessed 
that  the  political  is  far  ahead  of  the  religious 
Institution.  The  Protestant  Anglo-Saxon  has 
evolved  a  State  which  the  whole  civilized  world 
is  seeking  to  adopt  or  to  appropriate  in  one  shape 
or  other ;  but  Anglo-Saxon  Protestantism  is  the 
most  dissevered,  disjointed,  atomic  Religion  that 
exists. 


484  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

The  three  World-Eeligions  are  those  which  are 
seemingly  most  capable  of  some  kind  of  unifica- 
tion. The  fact  of  their  being  classified  together 
by  a  common  principle  indicates  their  point  of 
oneness.  This,  as  before  stated,  is  seen  in  the 
circumstance  that  they  all  in  one  way  or  other 
have  put  down  Naturism  and  Nativism,  and  thus 
have  transcended  wholly  or  partially,  tribal, 
national,  and  racial  Religion,  showing  therein  an 
element  of  universality,  whereby  they  are  mis- 
sionary Religions.  They  are  all  ethical  Relig- 
ions, each  after  its  fashion  undoubtedly,  for  some 
rites  and  doctrines  which  are  ethical  to  the  one  arc 
deemed  unethical  by  the  rest.  Then  again  all 
three  —  Mahomedanism,  Buddhism  and  Chris- 
tianity —  are  or  claim  to  be  humanity  Relig- 
ions, inculcating  charitv,  forgiveness,  love  of 
mankind  in  their  followers. 

These  three  World-Religions  are  in  a  process 
with  one  another,  in  a  sort  of  struggle  to  evolve 
the  one  "World-Religion.  Each  has  its  own  local- 
ity on  the  globe  where  it  maintains  itself  sub- 
stantially intact.  There  is  no  conversion  from 
one  to  the  other  taking  place,  except  in  the  case 
of  individuals  —  no  conversion  of  communities  or 
nations  from  one  another.  Yet  each  still  con- 
verts tribes  and  peoples  wdth  a  lower  Religion, 
that  is,  with  a  Nature-Religion.  Christianity 
seems  unable  to  move  the  Asiatic.  There  is 
much  meaning    in    the    historic  fact  that  it  was 


THE  EELIQIOUS  INSTITUTION.  485 

tried  in  Western  Asia  and  then  driven  out  per- 
manently—  expelled  from  the  place  of  its  origin 
and  early  propagation.  Hitherto  it  has  been  un- 
able to  get  out  of  Europe  except  in  one  way  — 
this  is  by  colonization,  which  has  largely  gone  to 
the  West.  America  is  Christian,  but  through  the 
migration  of  European  peoples,  who  have  come 
to  the  new  world  to  improve  their  social  and 
political  condition,  and  brought  their  religion 
along.  Thus  the  secular  motive  has  been  the 
chief  cause  of^the  greatest  recent  spread  of  Chris- 
tianity. And  it  would  seem  that  the  secular 
Institutions  of  Christendom  are  to  become  its 
greatest  and  most  successful  missionaries. 

The  omnireligious  Process  is  as  yet  but  a  ten- 
dency and  will  probably  remain  so  for  a  long 
time.  We  may  glance  at  it  in  three  different 
aspects,  which  are,  however,  interconnected. 

I.  The  external  organization  which  the  one 
World-Religion  may  take,  is  of  course  not  easy 
to  determine.  Already  we  have  noted  points  of 
agreement,  which  have  shown  a  tendency  to  crys- 
tallize themselves  into  something  like  a  perma- 
nent form. 

( 1 )  The  most  significant  gathering  of  repre- 
sentatives of  all  civilized  Religions  in  Asia,  Eu- 
rope, and  America  was  the  justly  renowned  Par- 
liament of  Relioions  during  the  World's  Fair  at 
Chicago  in  1893.  Its  spirit  was  to  find  com- 
mon grounds  of  faith  and  doctrine  in  the  vast 


486  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

multiplicity  of  Religions,  from  authoritative  ex- 
ponents of  each.  In  what  may  be  called  senti- 
mental religion — humanity,  charity,  love  — 
there  was  a  very  general  agreement.  But  when 
it  came  to  the  conception  of  God,  the  differences 
remained  what  they  were  before. 

(2)  Cases  of  interreligious  alliances,  in  which 
different  forms  of  Eeligion  unite  for  a  religious 
purpose  common  to  them  all,  occur  not  infre- 
quently though  sporadically.  These  may  be 
deemed  centers  of  incipient  unification,  corre- 
sponding to  the  growth  of  international  agree- 
ments and  law. 

(3)  The  movement  of  the  political  world  is 
toward  federation  under  a  Constitution.  It  looks 
as  if  some  such  possibility  might  be  predicated 
of  the  religious  world,  when  the  lesson  of  politi- 
cal federation  has  been  learned  and  become  a 
part  of  the  universal  consciousness. 

In  such  case  each  religious  form  njust  recog- 
nize the  validity  of  the  other  within  its  sphere, 
and  even  guarantee  its  freedom  through  direct 
enactment.  This  is  something  more  than  mere 
negative  toleration,  it  is  a  positive  willing  of  the 
freedom  of  each  religion,  which  is  to  Mork  itself 
out  from  within.  Its  own  free  evolution  is  what 
must  be  primarily  safeguarded. 

II.  The  great  difficulty  pertaining  to  such  an 
alliance  or  federation  will  hover  about  the  con- 
ception of  God  and  its  formulation.     Sentimeu- 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  487 

tally  the  three  great  World-Religions  are  quite 
agreed  already,  but  theologically  they  disagree 
profoundly.  For  this  reason  many  religious 
sentimentalists  declaim  against  theology  with  a 
good  deal  of  intensity.  But  if  there  is  to  be  a 
Religious  Institution,  it  must  give  some  kind  of 
expression  to  the  God-consciousness,  which  can- 
not rest  wholly  content  with  charity  or  ethics, 
though  these  are  certainly  not  to  be  left  out. 

We  have  already  noticed  a  common  element  in 
the  unfolding:  of  all  Relio;ions — the  divine  Triad. 
This  germinal  unitary  principle  has  evolved  itself 
through  three  main  forms,  which  show  the  geur 
eral  movement  of  the  religious  spirit  of  man 
through  the  ages. 

( 1 )  In  the  unireligious  Process  we  set  forth 
the  primordial  divine  Triad  which  is  the  first 
source  of  all  Religions,  even  the  humblest.  Here 
we  need  only  refer  to  it  —  the  Creator,  the  De- 
stroyer, the  Restorer,  often  as  one  divine  Person, 
often  as  three  or  two. 

(2)  It  is  an  explication  of  God  the  Creator 
when  he  is  first  placed  in  a  divine  Famih^,  in 
which  he  is  the  father,  the  generator,  beg-ettino- 
other  Gods.  The  Family  is  the  creative  Institu- 
tion, reproducing  the  Ego,  human  and  divine. 
Hence  comes  the  domestic  Triad  as  religious, 
made  up  of  Father,  Mother,  Child,  all  of  them 
deities,  from  whom  in  one  way  or  other  proceeds 
the  world.     Polytheistic  Religions  show  various 


488  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

forms  of  this  domestic  Triad,  of  which  the  most 
striking  is  the  Egyptian,  composed  of  Osiris, 
Isis  and  Horus,  whose  grand  battle  is  with  the 
Destroyer,  who  is  thus  outside  of  this  Triad. 

(3)  The  third  great  Triad  in  the  Evolution  of 
Religions  is  that  of  the  Restorer,  the  Christian 
Trinity,  consisting  of  Father,  Son  and  Spirit. 
Here  the  Son  is  not  only  divine,  but  also  human, 
and  through  the  Spirit  takes  up  humanity  into 
his  return  to  God,  or  in  the  divine  process  of 
restoration. 

Such,  very  briefly  indicated  are  the  three  divine 
Triads  which  have  manifested  themselves  in  the 
Evolution  of  the  Religious  Institution,  and  which 
exist  explicitly  in  the  Christian  Religion  as  the 
complete  fulfillment  of  all  Religion.  But  we 
must  never  forget  that  the  Christian  Trinity, 
since  its  first  announcement,  has  also  had  a  mar- 
velous development  both  inside  and  outside  the 
Church,  of  which  fact  we  have  already  spoken 
sufficiently. 

The  Evolution  of  the  triune  Process  through 
the  asres  is  toward  actualizing  itself  in  an  Institu- 
tion  whose  end  is  freedom  in  its  highest  form 

III.  We  have  now  reached  the  Universal  Re- 
ligious Institution,  which,  like  all  Institutions, 
has  as  its  supreme  object  to  cherish  and  to  secure 
Free-Will.  It  is  itself  Free-Will  actualized, 
existent,  whose  content  is  to  will  Free- Will. 
But  it  does  this  in  its  own  distinctive  manner. 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  489 

Primarily  it  is  a  Religious  Institution,  whose  first 
word  must  be,  '■'■Thy  Tf7Z?  be  done."  Or  we 
may  cite  the  highest  example  in  another  expres- 
sion :  "I  come  to  do  thy  Will. ' '  And  again  with 
special  emphasis:  "Not  everyone  that  saith 
unto  me  Lord,  Lord,  shall  enter  the  kingdom  of 
Heaven,  but  he  that  doeth  the  Will  of  my  Father 
which  is  in  Heaven."  Thus  is  the  stress  placed 
upon  willing  the  Will  of  God  as  the  primal  relig- 
ious act,  or  perchance  attitude. 

But  the  further  question  rises :  What  is  the 
Will  of  God?  This  in  most  minds  demands 
some  special  content,  but  the  content  of  God's 
Will  is  universal,  is  Free-Will.  The  next  prob- 
lem is,  How  is  man  to  know  or  to  find  God's 
Will?  Not  only  in  himself  but  also  in  the  Re- 
ligious Institution,  which  must  be  ultimately  the 
Universal  Religious  Institution,  and  this  is  what 
makes  a  free  man  relio;ious  and  a  relioious  man 
free.  Of  such  an  Institution  there  will  be  the 
following  elements  in  reciprocal  union. 

(1)  The  free  God  —  the  universal  Self  or 
Person  who  knows  himself  as  Free-Will  actual- 
izing Frec-Will  in  the  w^orld.  God  can  only  be 
free  in  His  Institution,  through  Avhich  He  brings 
Free-Will  to  man.  A  capricious  God  is  not  the 
highest  form  of  divine  freedom,  just  as  little  is 
the  capricious  man  a  free  num.  In  the  Univer- 
sal Religious  Institution  God  is  free  for  the  first 
time,  that  is,  institutionally  free. 


4i>U  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

(2.)  The  free  Man  —  psychically,  morally, 
and  institutionally  free  the  Man  becomes  only  as 
a  member  of  the  Universal  Religious  Institution, 
through  which  the  free  God  wills  and  actualizes 
the  Free-Will  of  ^lan. 

(3. )  The  free  World  —  the  Universal  Religious 
Institution  whose  ruler  is  the  God  of  Freedom  or 
the  free  God,  will  make  the  "World  free.  The  ab- 
solute Person  or  the  All- Will  does  not  work  indi- 
vidually, and  hence  capriciously,  but  through  His 
Institution  which  is  for  all.  The  highest  point 
of  his  creativity  is  to  be  the  creator  of  freedom, 
in  the  Man  and  in  the  World  and  in  his  own  Self ; 
the  divine  Self-creation  means  ultimately  the 
creation  of  freedom  in  God,  Man,  and  the  World 
(as  Institution) 

Thus  faintly  but  not  fantastically  we  may  fore- 
cast the  outlines  of  the  result  of  the  omnirelig- 
ious  Process  in  its  Evolution  of  the  Universal 
Relifiious  Institution. 

Herewith  our  study  of  the  Evolution  of  the 
Religious  Institution  is  brought  to  a  conclusion, 
having  gone  through  its  triple  process  of  one, 
many,  and  all  religions.  We  have  noticed  a 
steady  ascending  movement,  not  leaving  out  the 
fact  that  much  still  remains  to  be  done.  On  the 
whole  the  Religious  Institution  of  the  present  is 
not  in  one  of  its  great  constructive  periods,  but 
lather  the  opposite.  Over  the  entire  world  it 
shows  more  disinte^rat  ion   llian    inteoration — a 


THE  RELIGIOUS  INSTITUTION.  491 

condition,  as  we  believe,  preparatory  to  a  world- 
religious  Institution. 

We  have  seen  Evolution  in  every  Institution 
both  secular  and  relioious.  It  shows  the  nega- 
tive  elements  which  have  to  be  overcome  in  all 
progress.  But  it  also  shows  how  Institutions 
are  subject  to  a  reversionary  movement,  how  they 
often  drop  back  to  former  stages  already  tran- 
scended. Particularly  Religion  has  such  a  ten- 
dency. Hundreds  and  hundreds  of  popular 
preachers  and  teachers  are  starting  every  day  the 
new  Religion,  which  is  invariably  found  to  be 
some  earlier  form  which  the  civilized  portion  of 
the  world  has  outgrown.  Doctrines  are  promul- 
gated, even  calling  themselves  Christian,  which 
seek  to  undermine  the  whole  institutional  world 
and  to  make  man  return  to  his  original  savage 
condition,  in  a  state  of  sexual  promiscuity. 

Thus  Religion  turns  completely  self -destructive, 
becoming  the  supporter  and  propagator  of  original 
sin,  which  is  its  first  article  of  faith.  For  origi- 
nal sin  is  the  reversion  from  the  higher  to  the 
lower  social  order,  is  a  going  back  to  a  pre- 
existent  lower  condition  of  the  race.  Religion  is 
to  rouse  within  you  the  sense  of  this  sin  and  its 
danger,  to  buoy  you  up  to  the  high-water  mark 
of  your  age's  civihzation,  above  all  to  keep  you 
from  reversion,  which  is  the  deepest  denial  of 
God's  Wil]  as  actualized  in  the  world.     This  is 


492  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  real  Fall  of  Man,  occurring  every  day,  and 
even  preached  as  a  doctrine  of  Eeligion. 

We  may  well  contemplate  the  Evolution  of  the 
Religious  Institution  as  a  new  means  of  salvation. 
"VYe  study  now  all  contemporaneous  Religions  on 
the  globe,  savage  and  civilized.  Then  we  study 
their  successive  stages  in  time,  and  find  both 
kinds  of  study  complementary  of  each  other. 
These  details  of  savage  life  and  of  folk-lore  help 
us  see  ourselves,  and  help  us  see  the  institutional 
order  in  which  we  live,  opening  our  eyes  to  the 
fact  that  there  is  always  a  reversion  going  on  in 
society,  a  streaming  backwards  of  certain  classes 
of  men  through  all  preceding  grades  to  the  very 
beo-innino;  in  savairerv.  To  stem  such  reversion 
at  its  fountain-head  is  getting  to  be  the  prime 
duty  of  the  Religious  Institution. 


SECTION'  THIRD.—  THE  EDUCATIVE 
INSTITUTION. 

Thus  we  shcall  designate  the  third  great  Insti- 
tution or  series  of  Institutions,  intending  by 
calling  it  educative  to  give  it  a  wide  sweep  —  much 
wider  than  what  is  usually  included  under  the 
term  educational.  The  School  of  Life  is  hardly 
deemed  an  educational  Institution,  yet  the  very 
essence  of  it  is  that  it  is  educative. 

In  general  the  object  of  the  Educative  Insti- 
tution is  the  reproduction  of  the  Institutional 
Person.  That  is,  the  reproduction  of  the  World 
of  Institutions  in  all  Egos,  young  and  old;  every 
individual,  of  every  grade  and  age,  is,  through 
Education,  to  be  trained  into  an  institutional  con- 
sciousness internally,  and  into  an  institutional  life 
externally. 

(493) 


494  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Such  is  the  ultimate  end  of  the  Pxlucative  In- 
stitution, but,  as  we  shall  see,  it  has  other  very 
important  ends,  which,  however,  become  at  last 
means  for  that  one  supreme  end,  M^hose  essence 
is  Institutional  Freedom. 

So  the  Educative  Institution  is  just  that  Insti- 
tution whose  supreme  object  and  content  is  to 
re-create  Institutions  in  every  human  soul  and  to 
give  them  a  continuous  new  birth  therein.  The 
whole  institutional  world  both  secular  and  relig- 
ious (which  Ave  have  just  considered)  is  to  be 
re-born  in  each  child  and  in  each  man,  through 
Education  and  its  special  Institution,  whose  treat- 
ment lies  before  us. 

The  highest  organized  consciousness  of  the 
race,  its  civilization,  expresses  itself  in  these  In- 
stitutions. Through  them  the  child  and  the  man 
live  the  life  of  humanity;  indeed  only  through 
them  can  the  human  being  share  in  the  spiritual 
movement  of  his  species. 

Still  we  have  all  to  be  trained  into  this  partic- 
ipation, and  to  be  kept  continually  in  training, 
through  the  Educative  Institution.  Thus  the 
human  being,  however  young,  however  old,  must 
always  be  in  the  process  of  Education  as  his 
deepest  need,  as  his  spirit's  strongest  support; 
he  cannot  do  without,  indeed  he  cannot  get  out- 
side of  the  Educative  Institution  in  its  complete 
periphery. 

The  Educative  Institution  in  its  primal  origin 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  496 

undoubtedly  goes  back  to  the  Family,  which  is 
indeed  the  fountain  of  all  Institutions.  We  have 
already  seen  that  the  end  of  the  Family  is  the 
reproduction  of  the  Person,  giving  him  first  of 
all  an  institutional  birth,  then  physical  care  and 
nurture  along  with  domestic  training.  As  far  as 
it  can,  the  Family  seeks  to  reproduce  in  the 
child  the  Institutional  Person,  but  finds  therein 
its  own  limits,  and  hence  calls  for,  or  rather  calls 
forth,  a  new  Institution  dedicated  to  this  very 
purpose,  namely  the  School  in  some  form. 

In  early  ages  the  Family  was  all  Institutions — 
domestic,  social,  religious,  political.  Then,  too, 
the  human  being  was  educated  by  and  in  the 
Family,  as  far  as  his  education  at  that  stage 
went.  In  addition  he  could  gather  up  the  treas- 
ures of  experience  from  the  lips  of  the  old  men 
of  his  community,  or  perchance  of  his  people, 
as  does  Telemachus  in  the  Odyssey.  But  with 
the  differentiation  of  Institutions  into  Family, 
Society,  State,  Church,  the  School  too  made  its 
appearance  as  a  distinct  Institution,  whose  func- 
tion is  essentially  to  prepare  the  young  for 
their  coming  institutional  life. 

The  Family  naturally  would  reproduce  only  it- 
self in  the  child,  namely  domestic  life.  Such 
was  its  limit :  it  could  not  adequately  reproduce 
the  total  institutional  world,  which  w^as  the  spir- 
itual heritage  of  the  child.  Through  the  Family 
the   human  being   becomes  a  domestic  Person, 


496  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

but  he  must  also  be  a  citizen,  a  member  of  so- 
ciety, in  general  a  complete  well-rounded  Insti- 
tutional Person.  So  there  rises  an  Institution 
which  returns  to  the  Family,  takes  the  child,  re- 
moves it  from  the  domestic  circle  (this  sepa- 
ration from  mother  and  father  must  take  place), 
and  inducts  it  into  a  new  institutional  world 
which  trains  it  into  the  comulete  possession  of 
its  spiritual  patrimony. 

In  this  sense  the  Educative  Institution  is  a  go- 
ing back  to  the  Family,  yet  a  going  forward  out 
of  it ;  also  going  back  to  the  secular  and  relig- 
ious Institutions,  and  a  recreation  of  them  in 
every  born  soul,  whereby  all  Institutions  are  not 
only  preserved  but  kept  eternally  active,  yea  are 
developed  into  newer  and  higher  phases  of  them- 
selves, by  means  of  the  limit-transcending  nature 
of  the  human  Ego. 

Like  all  Institutions,  the  present  one  is  Will 
actuaUzed,  existent,  and  at  work  in  the  world; 
it  is,  in  the  first  place,  an  actual  object,  whose 
essence  is  Free  Will,  being  administered  by  a  Free 
Will  which  wills  Free  Will;  that  is,  its  end  is 
freedom  as  institutional.  Such  is  the  common 
element  to  all  Institutions ;  but,  in  the  second 
place,  the  special  function  of  the  Educative  In- 
stitution is  to  train  the  Ego  to  freedom ;  it  wills 
Free  Will  indeed,  but  in  its  own  distinctive  way, 
namely,  by  reproducing  it  in  a  human  soul,  which 
thereby  is  first  made  truly  actual,  being  brought 


THE  ED  UCA  TI VE  INS TITUTION.  497 

itself  to  will  Free  Will  as  actualized  in  Institu- 
tions. Thus  the  Educative  Institution  Avills  Free 
Will  by  calling  forth  and  developing  the  same  in 
the  Ego,  which  in  its  turn  re-creates  and  vital- 
izes Free  Will  in  the  whole  institutional  world. 
Hence  we  have  to  penetrate  psychologically  the 
Educative  Institution  in  its  fundamental  pro- 
cess. 

'*  A  free  man,  in  a  free  world,  among  free- 
men "  —  so  we  may  state  in  a  general  way  the 
end  of  Institutions,  through  which  not  one  or 
some  or  many  but  all  can  be  free.  And  the  Ed- 
ucative Institution  is  to  unfold  all  into  this  free- 
dom. Every  child  is  born  into  Institutions,  he 
has  inherited  them  as  possibilities  from  his  ances- 
tors. Thus  he  has  them  potentially  at  birth; 
education  is  to  make  them  actual.  The  child  at 
his  highest  is  the  possibility  of  the  whole  insti- 
tutional world,  of  all  civilization,  out  of  which 
potential  condition  he  is  to  be  unfolded  just  by 
an  Institution,  the  Educative,  into  an  actual 
Person. 

Returning  to  the  specially  psychological  aspect 
of  the  present  sphere,  we  can  see  that  it  is  the 
third  stage  of  the  total  Institutional  Psychosis, 
which  signifies,  in  general,  the  return  to  and  the 
reproduction  of  wdiat  has  gone  before  (here  the 
secular  and  religious  Institutions).  For  this  is 
the  Institution  which  goes  back  and  reproduces 
and  keeps  alive  and  actual  all  the  other  Institu- 

32 


498  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tions  of  man,  internalizing  them  in  every  born 
Ego,  establishing  within  the  hnman  being  the 
outer  established  world,  eternally  rebuilding  it  in 
every  soul. 

The  Educative  Institution  is,  on  the  whole, 
secular,  yet  not  in  the  sense  of  the  Secular  In- 
stitution as  such,  which  we  have  already  set 
forth  as  composed  of  Family,  Society,  State. 
The  Secular  Institution  actualizes  the  individual 
Will  in  some  form  of  Desire,  as  previously  de- 
clared (seep.  46,  47);  but  whence  conies  this 
Secular  Institution  which  thus  seems  taken  for 
granted  not  only  as  existent,  but  as  the  working 
principle  in  human  consciousness?  Just  this  is 
the  supreme  object  of  the  Educative  Institution, 
which  reaches  back  to  the  Secular  Institution  and 
reproduces  it  in  every  born  Ego,  or  is  to  do  so. 
In  a  former  statement  of  this  book  (p.  53),  the 
reproduction  of  the  Person  is  afHrmed  to  be  the 
common  end  of  the  Secular  Institutions — Fam- 
ily, Society,  State;  but  the  reproduction  of 
these  Secular  Institutions  in  each  self  must  also 
be  brouo;ht  about,  which  is  the  function  of  the 
Educative  Institution.  The  Institution  may  se- 
cure Free-Will,  yet  such  Institution  itself  must 
be  secured.  This  is  done  by  the  new  Institution, 
the  Educative  one,  which  recreates  from  genera- 
tion to  generation  the  institutional  world  in  the 
human  Effo.  In  ordinary  secular  life  the  Individ- 
ual  wills  the  Institution,  but  just  this  act  of  will- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  499 

ing  the  Institution  must  be  trained  into  him,  or 
rather  evolved  out  of  him  by  Education,  which 
is  itself  an  Institution  for  that  very  purpose. 

Thus  the  Secular  Institution  with  which  we 
started  is  itself  produced  through  an  Institution, 
and  we  have  completed  the  institutional  cycle. 
For  instance,  civilized  man  satisfies  his  wants  not 
immediately  but  through  the  Social  Order ;  but 
he  has  to  be  trained  into  willing  this  Social  Order 
as  the  means  for  satisfying  his  wants.  Still  more 
profoundly  he  has  to  be  trained  into  willing  the 
Law  of  the  State  in  order  that  it  may  secure  his 
freedom.  All  this  is  performed  by  the  Educative 
Institution  when  it  does  its  duty. 

But  this  Educative  Institution  —  how  does  it 
get  to  be?  There  is  no  doubt  that  it  has  been 
directly  evolved  out  of  the  Religious  Institution, 
though  it  has  its  roots  far  back  in  the  Family. 
The  Religious  Institution  has  always  had  some 
form  of  training  into  the  God-consciousness  for 
its  laity  and  especiall}^  for  its  priesthood,  both  of 
which  are  to  will  God's  Will  throuo;h  the  Religious 
Institution,  But  man  is  also  to  obey  the  Law  of 
the  Secular  Institution,  to  will  its  Will,  and  into 
this  consciousness  he  must  likewise  be  schooled. 
Thus  the  distinction  between  secular  and  religious 
passes  into  the  School,  and  produces  two  kinds — 
which  distinction  is  strongly  at  work  to-day. 
The  Public  School  has  been  secularized,  which 
suggests  that  it  was  previously  religious,  or  under 


600  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

religious  surveillance.  After  no  small  struggle 
has  this  taken  place,  whereby  the  Educative  In- 
stitution has  achieved  independence,  and  become 
an  Institution  co-ordinate  with  the  other  two. 

This  independence,  however,  does  not  mean  that 
it  is  to  be  indifferent  to  the  Religious  Institution. 
On  the  contrary,  the  Educative  Institution,  when 
it  has  attained  the  performance  of  its  whole  duty, 
is  to  reproduce  the  Religious  Institution  also  in 
every  born  soul,  and  not  alone  the  secular  Insti- 
tution. How  this  is  to  be  done,  is  distinctly  one 
of  the  educational  problems  of  the  future  ;  that 
it  is  to  be  done,  there  can  be  no  doubt.  In  the 
struggle  for  independence,  the  Educative  Insti- 
tution very  naturally  went  a  little  too  far  in  set- 
ting aside  the  Religious  Institution  from  public- 
instruction  ;  but  there  must  be  a  reconcilement 
and  a  restoration,  of  course  in  the  right  way; 
each  needs  the  other,  each  is  incomplete  without 
the  other. 

The  Educative  Institution  has  not  reached  its 
fulfillment  till  it  embraces  in  its  scope  the  whole 
institutional  world,  both  secular  and  religious, 
re-creating  and  keeping  alive  the  same  in  every 
individual,  young  and  old.  As  already  said,  it 
is  the  third  and  final  stage  of  the  total  institu- 
tional Psychosis,  completing  the  triune  process 
eternally  creative  of  all  Institutions.  These  three 
stages  must  be  conceived  not  simply  in  their 
apartness  but  also  in  their  unity,  which  is  their 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  501 

perpetual  movement  corresponding  to  that  of  the 
Ego  itself  in  creating  them . 

Next  we  are  to  consider  the  Educative  Institu- 
tion as  having  a  process  within  itself ,  which  shows 
the  primal  fact  of  its  organization.  A  threefold 
movement  we  shall  see,  whose  separate  stages 
we  can  look  at  as  three  different  Schools,  yet  in- 
terrelated and  forming  the  total  Educative  Insti- 
tution. 

I.  The  Public  School,  which  takesthe  child,  or 
the  human  Ego  as  potential,  instinctive,  unde- 
veloped, with  the  institutional  world  implicit  in 
it,  which  is  through  education  to  be  made  explicit 
and  consciously  active.  Such  a  School,  however, 
will  be  limited  by  its  community,  and  so  is  a  com- 
munal School  through  which  all  are  to  pass,  re- 
ceiving thereby  a  general  training  needful  for 
their  communal  life. 

II.  The  Special  School,  which  gives  special 
training  to  the  individual  both  in  the  matter  of 
culture  and  of  vocation.  It  breaks  up  and  divides 
the  previous  common  education  into  particular 
directions,  according  to  personal  preference  and 
talent. 

III.  The  Universal  School,  which  is  again  a 
common  School,  but  not  the  first  one,  being  the 
School  of  Life  which  all  must  enter  and  be  dis- 
ciplined under  a  new  teacher,  who  goes  by  vari- 
ous names,  such  as  Spirit  of  the  Age,  Providence, 
the    World-Spirit,    Civilization.      This    School 


502  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

takes  the  adult,  having  perchance  graduated 
from  both  the  PubUc  and  the  Special  Schools, 
and  puts*  him  under  a  universal  training  through 
the  universal  schoolmaster,  who  reproduces  in 
him  creative]}'  the  institutional  world  by  actual 
experience  as  well  as  by  mirroring  it  in  Art, 
Literature,  Science,  and  Philosophy.  This  is, 
then,  the  absolute  or  universal  Educative  Insti- 
tution, which  calls  forth  the  other  preceding 
Schools,  and  for  whose  end  they  exist. 

The  Public  or  Communal  School  develops  in 
the  human  being  the  Community  Life;  the 
Special  School  develops  in  the  human  being  his 
own  individual  selfhood  in  talent  and  vocation ; 
the  Universal  School  (or  Institute)  develops  in 
the  human  being  the  total  institutional  world. 
The  movement  is  that  each  Ego  must  first  be 
a  member  of  his  own  Community,  and  then 
through  his  own  self -unfolding  he  must  rise  into 
becoming  a  member  of  all  Communities  in  their 
universal  process,  which  means  that  he  is  to  be 
a  participator  in  the  "World's  Civilization.  He 
must  not  only  know  what  his  race  has  done  and  is 
doing  as  a  whole,  but  must  make  himself  a  factor 
in  its  total  movement. 

To  express  the  institutional  world  we  may 
sometimes  use  the  word  Civilization,  though  the 
term  is  hardly  adequate.  It  is  a  Roman  thought 
and  is  derived  from  Roman  law;  Civilization 
makes  man    civilis,  hence  a  civis  or   citizen,    a 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  503 

member  of  the  State  which  gives  civil  rights  un- 
der the  civil  law,  all  of  which  pertain  to  the 
Secular  Institution.  But  the  purport  of  the  Ed- 
ucative Institution  is  broader,  it  has  also  to  repro- 
duce in  the  human  soul  the  Religious  Institution, 
which  was  just  the  element  lacking  in  the  later 
Eoman  world  when  it  went  to  pieces  and  was  suc- 
ceeded bv  organized  Christendom  with  its  Church, 
though  the  latter  preserved  Roman  Law  and  Civ- 
ilization. 

This  last  School  is  named  universal,  as  it  em- 
braces all  men,  and  trains  each  man  to  universality, 
and  is  itself  the  School  of  the  World  in  its  pro- 
cess of  actualizinor  freedom.  It  is  the  Institution 
created  for  reproducing  in  the  soul  the  creation 
of  Institutions,  when  the  man  has  become  the 
creator  of  Institutions  in  his  daily  life.  Thus  it 
trains  him  not  merely  to  know  the  institutional 
world,  but  to  be  creating  it  evermore  through 
living  it  creatively. 


CHAPTER  FIRST.  —  THE  PUBLIC  SCHOOL. 

This  is  often  called  the  Common  School,  being 
common  to  all  as  an  Educative  Institution,  teach- 
ing the  common  branches,  common  to  the 
community  and  necessary  for  social  intercommu- 
nication. It  takes  the  undeveloped  self  of  the 
child  and  unfolds  it  out  of  the  Family  into  the 
Community,  the  School  being  itself  a  Community, 
a  kind  of  reproduction  and  re-enactment  of  the 
latter' s  life,  whereby  the  immature  but  impres- 
sionable mind  is  brought  to  re-create  this  early 
stage  of  the  institutional  world. 

The  Community  is  the  primordial  unit  or  cell 
out  of  which  Society  is  evolved.  In  some  form  it 
is  compelled  to  have  a  School  for  the  purpose  of 
reproducing  itself  in  the  new-born  person,  who 
must  in  the  course  of  time  be  its  supporter.  The 
(504) 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  505 

primitive  Village  Community  had  some  such 
training,  though  chiefly  through  myth  and 
folk-lore  transmitted  by  tradition.  At  present 
the  Public  or  Communal  School  has  to  develop 
this  social  germ  inherited  by  every  infant.  This 
School  is,  accordingly,  the  first  stage  of  the 
Educative  Institution  which  has  to  preserve 
the  whole  institutional  world  by  recreating  it  in 
every  new  generation  and  thus  propagating  it  in 
each  oncoming  Free-Will  of  the  Community. 

The  Educative  Institution  is  not  directly  to 
embody  freedom,  or  to  reproduce  it  completely, 
but  is  to  reproduce  the  Institutions  which  repro- 
duce freedom,  making  it  actual  in  the  world. 
So  there  is  always  an  element  of  authority  in  the 
School,  which  has,  however,  freedom  as  its  end, 
training  the  untrained  mind  in  obedience  to  Law, 
whereby  the  human  being  becomes  free.  The 
School  must  always  be  governed,  but  it  must 
always  be  moving  toward  self-government. 

Very  briefly  we  shall  have  to  deal  at  present 
with  the  Public  School,  which  has  already  be- 
come one  of  the  most  important  Institutions. 
Merely  a  slight  sketch  of  its  idea  or  conception 
can  be  here  given,  this  conception  being  the 
germinal  process  underlying  not  only  the  Public 
School,  but  all  the  Schools  of  the  Educative  In- 
stitution—  being:  in  fact  the  inner  movement  of 
Education  itself. 

Education  may  be  taken  as  somewhat  different 


506  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

from  the  Educative  Institution,  just  as  Religion 
is  different  from  the  Religious  Institution.  The 
one  is  the  idea,  the  other  is  the  actuality  of  the 
idea.  Education  is  made  actual  in  its  In.->titution, 
is  organized,  endowed  with  a  body  as  it  were, 
and  given  to  the  peo})le.  Through  the  Educative 
Institution,  Education,  which  otherwise  is  simply 
an  idea  and  subjective,  belonging  to  the  few  or 
even  to  the  one,  is  imparted  to  all.  Hence  it  is 
often  said  that  Education,  or  rather  its  embodi- 
ment in  the  Public  School,  is  tlie  saving  principle 
of  popular  government,  which  depends  upon  the 
intelligence  of  the  people. 

We  may  here  consider  the  three  fundamental 
stages  of  Education,  which  are  constituents  of 
its  complete  process,  or  of  its  Conception. 

(1)  Education  is  Information.  Such  is  the 
most  immediate,  manifest,  and  indeed  general 
object  of  Education:  to  get  [knoAvledge.  The 
learner,  be  he  child  or  man,  in  the  Public  School 
or  in  the  School  of  Life,  is  to  take  up  and  assim- 
ilate certain  facts,  more  or  less  useful,  which  con- 
stitute a  body  of  instruction  or  of  information. 
This  is  the  pursuit  of  knowledge,  which  is  native 
to  the  aspiring  human  spirit.  Education  must, 
primarily,  impart  knowledge,  which  opens  the 
world  of  culture  to  the  growing  Ego. 

At  the  same  time  the  acquisition  of  knowledge 
can  become  one-sided.  It  can  be  so  emphasized, 
by  drill  and  otherwise,  that  it  stunts  or  stops  de- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  507 

velopinent.  Thus  Information  contradicts  its 
own  name  and  nature :  it  no  longer  informs  but 
deforms  the  mind.  It  is  well  known  that  some 
of  the  narrowest  souls  in  the  Eepublic  of  Letters 
have  been  men  of  the  greatest  erudition.  Hence 
comes  the  loud  call  for  an  Education  which  does 
not  simply  pour  in  from  the  outside,  but  unfolds 
from  the  inside  outwards.  That  is,  along  with 
the  training  of  the  Intellect  or  receptive  prin- 
ciple of  spirit,  we  must  have  a  training  (jf  the 
Will  or  the  active  principle  thereof.  Such  is 
the  demand  which  is  chiefly  heard  in  these  days 
in  opposition  to  the  so-called  old  method  of 
learning — a  demand  which  in  its  present  form 
goes  back  to  the  last  centurj^  but  which  has  its 
fountain-head  in  the  old  Greek  world. 

(2)  Education  is  Development.  So  we  make 
a  new  start,  on  the  inside,  so  to  say,  from  the 
Ego  itself,  which  is  now  to  be  unfolded  and  made 
real;  the  true  Self,  hitherto  overwhelmed  by 
acquisition  from  the  outside,  asserts  its  right  and 
takes  the  initiative.  The  word  Education  is 
cited  as  having  just  this  meaning,  which  is  that 
of  leading  out  and  of  developing. 

With  the  rise  of  Education  as  Development 
comes  the  need  of  method,  or  at  least  of  a  de- 
cided change  of  method.  The  branches  of 
Information  must  be  taken  not  so  much  for  the 
sake  of  Infornuition  as  of  Cultivation  ;  moreover 
they  must  be  taught  or  presented  in  such  a  way 


508  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

and  in  such  an  order  as  to  call  forth  with  the  least 
outlay  of  time  and  energy  the  latent  powers  of 
the  Ego,  transforming  all  its  potentialities  into  a 
complete  well-rounded,  actual  person.  The  or- 
ganization of  the  Educative  Institution  becomes 
the  great  object,  and  with  this  rises  the  concep- 
tion of  the  Normal  School,  which  is  to  train  the 
trainer.  Thus  the  Educative  Institution  also 
develops  and  completes  itself  in  its  various  organic 
members. 

But  this  stage  of  Education  likewise  reveals  its 
decided  limitation.  We  have  indeed  attained  the 
culture  of  the  individual,  which,  however,  be- 
comes individualistic.  Self-activity  is  the  grand 
doctrine,  but  this  activity  of  the  Self  ends  or  may 
end  in  selfishness.  We  have  let  loose  the  Esfo 
and  bid  it  speed  forth  in  all  directions  untram- 
meled,  and  thereby  unfold  its  freedom;  the 
result  is  it  has  unfolded  its  freedom  into  caprice, 
perchance  into  Hcense,  or  is  in  danger  of  so 
doing. 

Education  is,  therefore,  beginning  to  place 
limits  upon  those  favorite  categories :  self -activ- 
ity, self-culture,  self-development.  It  goes  so 
far  as  to  emphasize  control,  authority,  even  re- 
straint and  suppression,  but  the  latter  would  sig- 
nify the  extreme  of  reaction.  There  is  no  doubt, 
however,  that  the  individualistic  Education  of  the 
time  must  be  transformed,  without  throwing  away 
the  thought  of  inner  development,  and  of  true 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  6UU 

freedom.  How  can  the  work  be  done?  At  this 
point  we  pass  to  the  third  stage  of  Education 
which  seems  in  the  present  epoch  to  be  dawning. 

(3)  Education  is  institutional.  The  pro- 
foundest  element  of  Education  is  just  this,  its 
determining  ethical  end;  all  its  other  elements 
become  at  last  means  for  this  supreme  end.  Ed- 
ucation must  now  realize  itself  in  an  Institution 
whose  chief  object  is  to  train  to  an  institutional 
life.  So  we  come  to  the  Educative  Institution, 
which  is  to  impart  Information,  to  give  Develop- 
ment, and  supremely  to  recreate  in  thought  and 
conduct  Institutions. 

Through  the  School  as  an  Educative  Institu- 
tion the  child  acquires  the  institutional  habit, 
which  is,  in  general,  to  will  Free-Will.  As  a 
member  of  the  organization  he  is  ruled  by  law, 
as  if  he  belonged  to  the  State.  For  every  free 
act  of  his  he  must  will  the  free  action  of  the 
whole  School.  He  learns  that  he  cannot  be  truly 
free  all  by  himself,  and  this  is  his  best  lesson. 
Every  act  must  be  universal,  must  be  what  all  can 
do,  or  what  is  lawful.  Even  if  he  speaks,  it  must 
be  through  the  will  of  the  -whole  embodied  in  the 
authority  of  the  teacher  and  of  the  School. 
Otherwise  his  speakingmay  assail  the  Institution, 
and  thereby  violate  the  Free-Will  of  all. 

In  complete  Education,  then,  these  three  ends 
are  present:  (1)  knowledge,  the  appropriation 
of  what  is  different  or  unknown,  the  outer  world 


510  SOCIAL  lySTITUTIONS. 

assimilated  by  the  Ego;  (2)  the  separation  of 
the  Ego  within,  and  the  unfolding  and  expressing 
of  itself  through  Will,  the  making  of  the  poten- 
tial Ego  real  in  a  complete  self -active  center,  the 
whole  being  the  sphere  of  individual  freedom ; 
(3)  the  return  to  the  outer  world,  which  is  not 
now  that  of  mere  knowledge,  or  the  information 
about  things  more  or  less  external,  but  the  world 
of  Institutions,  existent  and  objective  on  the  one 
hand,  yet  in  and  through  the  Ego  on  the  other. 

It  is  manifest  that  we  behold  in  these  three 
stages  of  Education  not  only  so  man}''  separate 
isolated  phases,  but  an  inner  connection  which 
unites  them  in  a  process,  yea,  just  the  funda- 
mental psychological  process,  the  Psychosis. 
They  all  belong  together,  no  Educative  Institution 
can  do  without  them  all,  and  all  at  once.  It  is 
true  that  sometimes  the  stress  is  put  on  one  and 
sometimes  on  the  other,  still  all  are  present. 
But  the  deepest  principle  of  the  three,  as  well 
as  the  supreme  end  of  Education  is  the  third. 
Yet  we  must  not  foraret  that  it  could  not  be  and 
act  without  the  other  two. 

It  is,  therefore,  a  mistake  to  denounce  the 
acquisition  of  knowledge  as  one  purpose  of  the 
School.  It  could  not  exist  without  such  an  end, 
and  knowledo-e  has  a  rio;ht  to  be  loved  for  its 
own  sake.  Certainly  every  aspiring  pupil  will 
take  delio;ht  in  learnino-  on  its  own  account.  It 
means  mastery  of  the  external  limit  in  some  forui 


THE  ED  UCA  TI VE  I^S  TITUTION.  5 1 1 

and  triumph  of  the  spirit  —  a  justifiable  joy  if 
there  be  any,  since  such  a  mastery  is  prophetic 
of  freedom,  which  prophecy  is  fulfilled  by  the 
Institutional  World. 

Here  we  may  note  the  fact  that  these  three 
stages  of  the  educational  process  are  also  stages 
of  its  history.  Leaving  out  the  ancient  and 
medieval  period  for  the  present,  Ave  find  that  the 
Renascence  put  stress  upon  Learning,  Liforma- 
tion,  Expression,  in  its  strong  yet  one-sided 
attempt  to  recover  and  reproduce  antiquity. 
This  was  the  need  of  the  age  and  its  educators 
responded,  but  the  time  came  when  the  right  of 
inner  Development  was  demanded  by  the  chafing 
human  Ego,  which,  accordingly,  asserted  the  full, 
free  unfolding  of  the  Individual.  Montaiofne 
started  the  cry,  which  was  taken  up  by  Rousseau 
and  made  to  re-echo  through  Europe ;  Pestalozzi 
and  Froebel  realized  the  thought  in  educational 
Institutions.  At  present  we  are  turning  to  the 
Institution  itself  and  looking  into  that;  we  are 
beginning  to  find  that  in  it  lies  the  deeper  fact 
of  the  whole  movement. 

So  much  upon  the  Conception  of  the  School, 
in  which  we  shall  always  find  the  three  stages 
which  we  may  name  the  informational,  the  de- 
velopmental, and  the  institutional  —  none  ever 
absent  and  each  in  a  process  with  the  rest,  yet 
the  latter  largely  implicit  hitherto  in  educational 
history.     All  three  belong  really  to  the  general 


512  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Educative  Institution  —  the  Institution  which 
trains  people  small  and  great,  young  and  old,  into 
the  Institutional  "World. 

The  School,  then,  in  its  Conception  or  creative 
Thought,  must  be  informational,  developmental 
and  institutional,  all  three  as  distinct  and  yet  in 
a  process  together,  which  is  the  veritable  soul  of 
the  School,  its  creative  Psychosis. 

It  is  the  third  stage  —  the  institutional  — which 
is  to  become  explicit  in  the  American  School  Sys- 
tem, as  this  must  give  the  training  to  freedom, 
that  is,  institutional  freedom.  The  Prussian 
School  System  is  probably  the  best  in  the  world 
for  the  first  two  stages  —  the  informational  and 
the  developmental  —  but  in  the  third  it  must  be 
completely  transformed  to  suit  this  country. 
We  may  well  learn  from  Germany  in  regard  to 
methods  of  imparting  knowledge  and  of  training 
the  individual  mind ;  but  the  German  institu- 
tional world,  and  specially  the  State,  is  so  differ- 
ent from  the  American  that  there  must  be  a  cor- 
responding transformation  of  the  School,  which 
is  ultimately  to  re-produce  just  the  Nation's  In- 
stitutions in  the  mind  of  the  pupil. 


CHAPTER    SECOND.  —  THE    SPECIAL 
SCHOOL. 

Under  this  head  is  embraced  a  great  variety  of 
schools  wliich  come  after  the  Public  School,  and 
give  some  form  of  special  training  for  life.  It 
is  the  sphere  of  diversity,  of  particularity  in 
which  the  individual  largely  chooses  on  what  line 
he  will  develop  himself,  and  for  what  vocation 
he  wnll  prepare  himself.  The  Public  School  in 
a  certain  degree  gives  the  knowledge  and  disci- 
pline which  are  common  to  all  specialties,  hence 
it  is  often  called  the  Common  School.  In  it  the 
field  of  selection  for  the  student  is  not  large, 
though  the  choice  of  studies  may  well  begin  in 
the  High  School.  But  in  the  Special  School, 
the  general  or  common  character  of  the  Public 
School  shoots  off  into  many  particular  direc- 
33  (513) 


i>  1  t  .V OCIAL  ly S TI T U TIOSS. 

lions,  according  to  individual  proferent^e  and 
talent. 

As  we  have  already  noted,  the  Public  or  Com- 
mon School  is  a  Conimunit}"  School,  audits  chief 
end  is  to  make  every  child  a  member  of  the  Social 
"Whole,  furnishing  to  it  both  the  means  and  the 
training  to  participate  in  the  institutional  life  of 
the  Community.  Such  Education  is  for  all  and 
must  be  given  to  all,  hence  it  is  paid  for  out  of 
the  public  purse.  The  student  in  the  Public 
School  is  generalJij  educated ;  but  if  he  is  ambi- 
tious, he  will  wish  to  he  specially  educated,  also. 
But  he  will  have  to  pay  for  this  special  education 
out  of  his  own  pocket,  with  a  few  exceptions. 

The  Special  School,  accordingly,  has  many 
forms,  it  shows  great  diversity  within  its  sphere, 
but  it  also  causes  a  great  separation  in  the  life  of 
the  pupil;  usually  he  separates  from  the  Home 
and  Community  in  which  he  was  born  and  raised, 
and  enters  a  wholly  new  social  environment. 
That  is,  his  immediate  relation  to  his  Home  and 
Communitj^  that  of  birth  and  nurture  and  early 
schooling,  is  broken;  a  new  element  enters  his 
existence,  he  goes  through  a  process,  inner  and 
outer,  which  he  has  never  known  before.  It  is 
a  separation  or  estrangement  from  his  impUcit 
institutional  life  hitherto,  in  order  that  he  may 
in  the  end  become  conscious  of  what  has  brought 
him  into  existence,  reared  him,  educated  him, 
and  possibl}'-  sent  him  away,  quite  as  the  mother 
has  to  wean  her  child. 


/  THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  515 

III  the  Special  School  the  pupil  has  in  a  way 
to  care  for  his  own  household,  he  forms  new 
associations,  and  has  a  new  outlook.  Moreover 
he  enters  a  new  Institution  and  has  t«  adjust 
himself  to  a  different  order  from  that  at  home. 

Great  is  the  multiplicity  of  these  Special 
Schools,  shooting  up  and  ramifying  society  in 
all  directions.  The  question  rises:  Can  we  put 
them  into  some  kind  of  a  system,  so  that  they 
may  be  surveyed  and  be  seen  to  be  a  part  of  the 
Educative  Institution  in  its  completeness,  where- 
of we  are  now  treating? 

In  the  first  place,  there  is  a  group  of  Special 
Schools  which  continue  the  work  begun  in  the 
Public  School,  specializing  it  into  details;  then 
there  is  the  group  which  may  be  called  profes- 
sional or  vocational  Schools  ;  finally  these  may  be 
united  in  one  great  School  which  thus  becomes 
the  University.  A  few  words  upon  each  of  these 
groups. 

I.  The  first  group  embraces  a  variety  of 
Schools  under  the  names  of  Academies,  Insti- 
tutes, and  particularly  Colleges.  These  Schools 
have  in  one  way  or  other  a  connection  with  the 
branches  which  have  been  begun  in  the  Public 
School.  Yet  they  add  or  claim  to  add  special 
elements  of  their  own,  in  the  way  of  method, 
thoroughness  and  new  branches.  More  particu- 
larl}',  religion  is  the  chief  motive  for  founding 
the  private  School  and  the  College.     Every  de- 


516  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

nomination  seeks  to  have  its  own  educational 
means  for  establishing  and  perpetuating  itself 
and  so  introduces  into  the  Educative  Institution 
all  the  divisions  of  sectarianism.  Hitherto  the 
College  has  supplied  the  higher  education  of  the 
United  States,  and  it  is  more  of  a  native  prod- 
uct than  any  other  kind  of  American  School. 
Its  influence  is  not  likely  to  pass  away,  in  spite 
of  the  recent  progress  of  the  University. 

Of  course  there  is  a  sreat  difference  among^ 
Colleges.  The  religious  bias  is  apt  to  cover  a 
multitude  of  educational  sins  in  the  minds  of  the 
patrons.  Its  very  limitation,  however,  gives 
certain  advantages.  There  is  no  question  that 
the  College  has  been  a  great  means  of  spreading 
advanced  education  throughout  the  land. 

II.  The  professional  or  vocational  School  is  a 
form  of  the  Special  School  wdiich  has  risen  into 
new  prominence  in  recent  years.  Every  calling 
requires  a  special  training ;  and  callings  are  be- 
comino'  more  and  more  diversified  and  exacting; 
in  modern  society,  so  that  the  Schools  for 
them  are  increasing  both  in  number  and  kind. 
In  the  vocational  School  the  individual  prepares 
himself  to  give  in  the  most  effective  manner 
his  contribution  to  the  Social  "Whole,  w^hich  is, 
of  course,  to  return  to  him  the  value  of  his 
service. 

These  Schools  are  by  nature  separative,  and 
often  spring  up  on  the  spot  where  they  are  most 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  .^17 

needed.  But  many  of  them  are  so  dependent  on 
general  studies,  particularly  in  the  case  of  sci- 
ences, that  they  cluster  around  the  educational 
institution  where  such  studies  are  taught. 

Hence  comes  the  tendency  of  the  vocational 
Schools,  at  least  those  of  the  higher  class,  to 
concentrate  in  one  locality,  where  they  can  help 
one  another  and  get  help  of  a  higher  kind  than 
if  they  were  isolated. 

III.  Thus  the  University  is  formed,  which,  as 
its  name  indicates,  proposes  to  embrace  all 
Schools  —  a  special  School  which  is  to  include 
substantially  all  special  schools.  Hence  the 
modern  University  shows  a  tendenc}'^  to  devote 
itself  to  specialization,  and  becomes  the  home  of 
specialists  in  the  various  sciences.  At  the  same 
time  it  does  not  neglect  the  element  of  universal 
culture. 

The  idea  of  the  University  is  ancient,  appar- 
ently going  back  to  Athens  and  Alexandria  in  an- 
tiquity. Next  it  rose  and  flourished  in  medieval 
Italy,  which  has  been  succeeded  in  modern  times  by 
Germany.  The  German  University  is  now  being 
copied  the  world  over,  particularly  in  America. 
It  produces  specialists  nuiinly,  which  fact  is  both 
its  strength  and  its  weakness.  We  are  often 
rightly  warned  against  premature  generalization, 
but  there  is  an  equal  danger  in  premature  special- 
ization. An  element  of  separation  and  exclusive- 
ness  lies  in  the  nature  of  such  work,  which  may 


518  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

beget  not  the  happiest  mental  traits  or  the  best 
character.  The  University  is  a  kind  of  aristoc- 
racy of  learning  which  but  few  comparatively 
can  enter. 

The  University  has  its  own  life,  which  is  not 
that  of  the  people  or  of  the  nation.  It  is  an  in- 
stitution within  itself,  having  its  own  society  and 
government.  This  estrangement  of  the  pupil 
from  his  regular  institutional  life  has  unquestion- 
ably its  discipline,  but  it  also  has  its  dangers. 
The  graduate  feels  the  breach  between  himself 
and  the  world  which  he  has  to  enter  after  leaving 
the  University;  this  breach  should  not  be  made 
too  great,  else  he  may  never  be  fully  able  to  har- 
monize himself  with  the  life  of  the  Social  Whole, 
having  become  so  deeply  absorbed  in  one  little 
part  of  it  in  his  formative  period. 

In  its  instruction  the  University  largely  deals 
with  the  past,  and  seeks  to  reproduce  the  move- 
ment of  former  periods  of  culture  in  the  mind  of 
the  student,  who  thus  possesses  the  historic  con- 
ditions of  his  own  culture  as  well  as  that  of  his 
time.  In  this  training  also  there  is  a  o:reat  and 
important  element  of  self-estrangement ;  the 
young  man  is  turned  away  from  the  immediate 
present,  and  is  made  to  live  in  the  past,  till  he 
returns  to  the  present  with  the  movement  of  the 
race.  On  leaving  the  Universitv  he  has  attained 
his  institutional  majority,  whatever  be  the  exact 
number  of  his  years.     He  has  passed  through 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  519 

the  Public  and  the  Special  School  with  their 
distinct  social  training  and  has  entered  real 
society  or  the  institutional  world  to  which  he  as 
citizen  and  workman  of  some  kind  is  to  con- 
tribute his  part  in  order  to  receive  his  reward. 

Still  he  soon  finds  himself  aoain  in  training:,  he 
is  not  out  of  school  by  any  means ;  in  his  town 
or  village,  however  small  or  remote,  there  is  a 
branch  of  the  training-school  of  the  world  in 
which  he  soon  discovers  himself  to  be  a  pupil, 
usually  a  green  pupil,  with  many  things  to  learn 
in  their  rudiments.  In  time  he  will  be  aware 
that  this  is  a  new  University  more  universal  than 
the  University  so  named  which  he  formerly  at- 
tended. The  Special  University  as  the  School  of 
Vocations  shows  itself  to  his  mind  now  in  decided 
contrast  to  the  Absolute  University  as  the  School 
of  Life.  The  University  of  Civilization  dawns 
upon  him,  truly  universal,  having  its  teachers 
also,  who  are,  however,  not  chosen  by  some 
Board  of  Directors  or  by  some  President  of  a 
School,  but  selected  by  the  thing  to  be  done, 
which  means  that  they  are  self-chosen  in  the 
highest  sense. 

Thus  we  have  made  the  transition  to  the  Uni- 
versal Educative  Institution,  which  is  not  and 
cannot  be  the  University  so  called,  as  the  latter 
is  a  part  of  the  former's  process.  The  grand 
whole  of  the  Educative  Institution  now  appears, 
and  shows  its  inherent  nature  which  is  creativity, 
since  it  has  to  reveal  and  to  reproduce  in  perpet- 


620  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ually  new  forms  the  groAvth  and  movement  of 
the  institutional  world.  This  is  to  be  brought 
home  in  its  very  genesis  now  going  on,  to  the 
human  consciousness,  chiefly  through  Art  and 
Literature. 

But  Art  and  Literature  as  creative  have  sel- 
dom had  their  abode  at  the  University,  which, 
however,  has  had  much  to  say  of  their  past,  and 
of  their  formal  characteristics.  But  the  Liter- 
ary Bibles  of  the  world  are  not  the  products  of 
the  University  proper,  but  of  the  Universal  Edu- 
cative Institution  in  which  they  are  the  lasting 
text-books,  though  the  University  does  much  to 
preserve  them  and  to  keep  them  alive  in  the  con- 
sciousness of  the  passing  generations.  Criticism 
is  found  at  the  University, -not  much  creation; 
it  gives  past  processes  in  Literature,  Art,  Science 
and  Philosophy,  which  indeed  condition  the 
present,  but   are   not   the   present. 

But  the  Universal  Educative  Institution  shows 
the  processes  at  work  now ;  creativity  is  its  word, 
and  it  seeks  to  express  the  new  conception  which 
the  Spirit  of  the  Age  is  realizing.  Doubtless  the 
people  as  a  whole  feel  the  first  pulsations  of  the 
new  idea  soon  to  be  born,  but  they  cannot  utter 
it  except  in  a  fitful  manner.  Some  individual 
first  expresses  what  lies  brooding  in  all;  this  ex- 
pression brings  them  to  a  consciousness  of  them- 
selves and  thus  educates  them  in  a  new  school  by 
a  new  training  with  a  new  schoohnaster.  All 
this  we  shall  next  consider. 


CHAPTER  THIRD.  —  THE  UNIVERSAL 
SCHOOL. 

It  is  not  easy  to  find  a  suitable  term  for  the 
present  chapter,  which  takes  a  wide  sweep  over 
a  large  domain  embracing  many  different  spirit- 
ual activities.  We  wish  to  keep  before  the 
reader  that  this  is  still  an  Institution,  and  an 
Educative  Institution,  amid  all  its  divisions  and 
diversities ;  it  is  a  form  of  actualized  Will  whose 
purpose  is  to  reproduce  Free- Will  in  the  soul  of 
all,  especially  of  the  grown  man  pursuing  his 
vocation. 

In  the  heading  above  we  call  it  the  Universal 
School  in  order  to  suggest  in  the  name  its  corre- 
lation with  the  other  two  Schools,  Public  and 
Special.  Still  its  purport  is  wider  than  the  ordi- 
nary School,  and  we  shall  often  call  it  the  Univer- 

(521) 


o22  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

sal  Educative  Institution,  or,  for  short,  the  Univer- 
sal Institute,  quite  distinct  from  the  University 
proper  which  has  been  considered  in  the  previous 
chapter.  Still  we  may  sometimes  designate  it  as 
the  University  of  Civilization,  to  which  all  men 
belong  and  through  which  all  have  to  pass  in  one 
way  or  other;  thus  it  is  truly  universal,  the 
School  of  Life,  the  World's  Institute. 

In  a  way  it  is  a  return  to  the  Common  or  Pub- 
lic School,  through  which  all  ought  to  pass  in 
order  to  possess  the  primary  implements  of  Civ- 
ilization. It  is  the  final  or  absolute  School  for 
which  the  previous  Schools  have  been  a  prepa- 
ration, into  which  they  move  and  out  of  which 
they  are  called  forth.  It  is  their  creative  source, 
their  determining  principle,  and  also  their  ulti- 
mate end.  It  is  an  Institution,  but  an  Institu- 
tion which  is  likewise  to  reveal  man  to  himself 
as  the  moulder  and  the  moulded  of  Institutions. 

The  School  of  the  World,  then,  we  have  before 
us;  but  who  is  the  teacher?  Ultimately  the 
World-Spirit,  the  absolute  Ego  who  is  at  the 
center  of  Civilization  and  is  unfoldino-  it  into  a 
colossal  image  of  himself.  Undoubtedh^  there 
are  many  other  teachers,  every  grade  in  fact ; 
but  the  World-Spirit  is  the  chief  pedagogue  in 
the  World-School. 

Moreover  he  has  been  at  work  from  the  begin- 
ning. Secretly  he  had  a  hand  in  the  Public 
School    and    organized    it    for  his    own  behoof, 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  523 

training  the  youth  of  the  land  for  his  purpose, 
which  is  indeed  their  own  highest  purpose. 
Also  he  was  at  work  in  the  University,  preparing 
its  inmates  specially  for  the  task  of  his  School, 
which  is  verily  the  sum  total  of  all  Schools,  and 
in  which  he  is  finally  to  reveal  himself,  and  teach 
himself  what  he  is. 

Still  this  Institution,  though  the  end  of  all 
other  Institutions,  is  itself  also  a  means  for  their 
end  which  is  freedom,  and  this  freedom  thereby 
can  only  be  institutional  freedom.  Thus  they 
all  come  back  to  the  individual  and  elevate  him 
into  the  universal  life,  while  he  on  the  other 
hand  must  incessantly  reproduce  them,  both 
knowing  and  willing:  them.  The  Institutions  of 
Civilization  mean  the  Institute  of  Civilization, 
the  universal  training-school  of  humanity  unto 
the  one  great  end,  freedom  as  institutional. 

We  have  called  this  the  Universal  Educative 
Institution,  because  it  is  all  three  —  universal, 
educative,  and  institutional.  It  is  universal:  all 
must  enter  it,  the  training  is  universal,  the 
teacher  is  the  universal  teacher,  and  the  man  is 
to  become  universal,  is  to  lead  the  universal  life. 
It  is  educative:  it  is  the  School  whose  end  is 
that  of  all  schooling,  and  which  embraces  a  vast 
constituency  of  Egos  receiving  their  discipline ; 
it  is  the  totality  of  the  race  being  trained  for  the 
race's  end.  It  is  institutional:  it  is  the  actual- 
ized AVill  of  man  willing;  Free  Will :  it  is  an  ex- 


624  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

istent  Institution  whose  object  is  to  reproduce 
the  institutional  world  in  every  human  being  both 
through  Will  and  Intellect,  through  the  experi- 
ence of  the  Deed  and  through  the  instruction  of 
the  AVord.  To  this  Institution,  therefore,  belong 
Art,  Literature,  Science,  Philosophy. 

The  Universal  Educative  Institution  is  thus 
the  true  University  of  Man,  whose  very  purpose 
is  to  reveal  and  to  teach  the  Universal  Creative 
Ego  eternally  creating  the  world,  especially  the 
world  of  Institutions  into  whose  processes  it  un- 
folds itself  and  thereby  reveals  itself.  In  this 
School  of  Life  you  may  take  the  lesson  imme- 
diately and  learn  it  through  j^ourself ,  transform- 
ing all  experience,  sad  and  joyful,  all  suffering 
and  all  happiness  into  a  means  for  your  own 
enfranchisement.  Likewise  the  events  goino:  on 
in  the  world  you  are  to  see  leading  the  race  along 
the  path  of  freedom,  in  spite  of  all  backstrokes 
of  destiny. 

Still  interpretation  is  needed,  the  World-Spirit 
uttering  itself  at  first  in  the  events  of  the  time 
must  have  a  new  utterance  in  Art,  Literature, 
Science.  Hence  the  new  teacher  appears,  the 
interpreter  of  the  World-Spirit  as  artist,  poet, 
thinker ;  this  new  teacher  is  the  creative  genius 
who  belongs  peculiarly  to  the  Universal  Educative 
Institution,  is  in  fact  its  leading  Professor, 
usually  a  very  diiferent  man  from  that  other 
Professor  in  the  University  proper. 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  525 

In  the  School  of  Life  we  may  start  with  the 
instruction  which  comes  from  the  Deed,  that  is, 
from  our  individual  Self  originating  actions, 
which  flow  out  from  the  Ego  as  a  center  and 
pass  into  the  world  of  occurrences.  Every  per- 
son is  such  a  center  of  concentric  waves  of  influ- 
ence moving  outwards.  But  also  they  come 
back  to  him  from  other  sources  and  determine 
him.  Still  the  main  fact  is  that  his  own  Deed 
comes  back  to  him  in  its  consequences,  having 
passed  through  the  institutional  world  in  some  of 
its  forms,  wdiich  return  to  him  his  conduct  as 
that  of  a  free-acting  individual.  Thus  every 
man  is  cited  before  a  court,  a  World-tribunal, 
which  metes  out  to  him  the  counterpart  of  his 
Self  in  reward  and  penalty.  Our  "World-School 
has  not  abolished  punishment,  not  even  corporeal 
punishment,  in  its  administration.  Throuo;h  the 
pains  and  penalties  flowing  from  the  Deed  the 
individual  learns  the  Law,  yea  learns  the  Divine 
Order,  in  which  he  lives  and  moves  and  has  his 
being.  So  much  instruction  he  may  acquire 
directly  through  his  own  action. 

But,  in  order  that  man  may  get  the  experience 
of  man,  a  record  must  be  kept  of  the  most  sig- 
nificant deeds  and  events,  which  show  forth  the 
decree  of  the  World-Spirit  or  the  divinely  creative 
Ego.  This  record  is  properly  the  work  of  the 
genius  making  his  poem,  picture,  statue,  or  speak- 
ing his  thought  as  one  with  that  of  the  Supreme 


526  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Thinker.  We  maj  call  him  the  recording  angel 
of  the  court  of  last  resort,  who  records  the  de- 
cision of  this  final  tribunal,  and  imparts  it  to 
man,  that  the  latter  may  know  tlie  Judgment 
and  the  Law  of  the  highest  Justiciary. 

This  record  in  its  various  forms  —  Poetry, 
Art,  Philosophy,  etc.  —  is  the  fundamental 
branch  in  the  Universal  Institute,  which  must 
also  have  its  text-books  of  instruction.  Now  the 
best  text-books  in  the  School  of  Civilization  have 
always  been  and  still  are  the  Bibles  of  the  race 
which  are  studied  in  the  great  Institute  of 
Humanity  for  the  purpose  of  revealing  to  man 
the  Divine  Order  and  the  workings  of  the 
Divine  Ego.  They  are  to  call  forth  in  him  the 
consciousness  of  the  Universal  Creative  Spirit 
or  Ego,  and  thus  are  religious  in  the  profoundcst 
sense.  Still  we  shall  find  these  Bibles  dividing 
themselves  into  two  kinds,  religious  and  literary 
or  secular.  This  distinction,  however,  we  shall 
elaborate  later ;  at  present  we  put  stress  on  the 
fact  that  both  kinds  develop  in  man  the  God- 
consciousness,  and  so  reproduce  in  him  the  relig- 
ious Institution. 

The  individual  educator,  while  educating  the 
youth  in  his  little  school,  is  often  being  educated 
by  this  supreme  Power  in  His  Great  School. 
Pestalozzi  at  Yverdon  was  working  away  in  his 
small  Institute  for  boys,  but  he  was  at  the  same 
time  under  trainiug  b}^  the  World-Spirit  in  whose 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  527 

Universal  Institute  he  was  chief  instructor  for  the 
people  in  all  countries  and  all  ages.  The  same 
is  true  of  Froebel  when  he  started  his  little  kin- 
dergarten for  the  little  child  at  Blankenburg ;  he 
was  really  an  original  teacher,  not  in  a  German 
University,  but  in  the  far  greater  University  of 
Civilization. 

Thus  we  seek  to  catch  some  outline  or  sug- 
gestion of  that  School  over  all  Schools  with  its 
supreme  Schoolmaster,  from  whom  proceeds  the 
New  Idea  which  is  to  be  im[)arted  to  all  man- 
kind. 

Further  Reflections  and  Illustrations.  We 
shall  try  to  expand  and  to  enforce  the  preceding 
thought  even  at  the  risk  of  some  repetition. 
The  Ego  as  Institution-maker  is  now  making 
an  Institution  whose  object  is  to  reveal  and 
thereby  to  reproduce  Institutions  in  the  mind  of 
the  recipient,  showing  them  in  their  origin, 
conflicts  and  meaning.  Such  is  our  Universal 
Institute,  training  man  to  know  himself  as  the 
ever-active  reproducer  and  supporter  of  the  insti- 
tutional world,  whose  final  stage  we  have  here 
reached,  since  it  turns  back  upon  itself  and 
looks  at  itself,  in  the  very  process  of  creation, 
of  course  through  an  Institution  created  for  that 
purpose. 

The  present  stage  is  the  completion  and  fulfill- 
ment of  both  secularity  and  religiosity,  as  well 
as  of  the  Educative  Institution.     In  a  sense  it  is 


528  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

connected  with  the  Church  universal,  also  with 
the  State  universal,  yet  both  are  now  to  be  united 
in  the  truly  Universal  Institution,  which  is  like- 
wise a  school,  the  o-reat  trainincr-school  of 
humanity,  whose  final  teacher  is  the  World- 
Spirit  incarnating  himself  in  the  Artist,  Poet, 
Thinker,  through  whom  he  is  to  obtain  expres- 
sion. 

Looking  back  at  the  religious  sphere,  we  ob- 
serve that  the  grand  dualism  of  existence  is  over- 
come through  Christianity — overcome  for  us  of 
the  Occident  at  least ;  j^et  this  is  a  religious  over- 
coming, hence  accomplished  through  the  renun- 
ciation of  the  individual,  through  death  and 
tragedy.  So  the  Great  Exemplar,  the  divine- 
human  Person  renounces  and  perishes  as  an  indi- 
vidual ;  he  is  tragic  in  his  conflict  with  the  world, 
though  internally ,  in  the  spirit,  he  triumphs.  StUl 
the  world  must  now  be  so  transformed  that  the 
divine-human  principle  will  not  bring  death  but 
life,  will  not  perish,  but  be  saved.  Accordingly, 
on  this  side  as  on  others,  there  is  a  call  for  a  new 
Institution  which  secures  to  man  his  complete 
selfhood. 

This  new  world  is  to  be  institutional ;  it  will  be 
the  product  of  the  "Will  whose  content,  end,  and 
purpose  is  to  actualize  the  "Will,  yet  in  a  new  way. 
The  Egfo  as  "Will  is  to  actualize  itself  in  an  Insti- 
tution  which  is  to  show  just  this  actualization ;  it 
is  an  Institution,    therefore,    which  reveals   the 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  529 

Ego  as  Will  to  itself  actualizing;  itself  in  an 
Institution.  Spirit  is  now  to  reflect  itself  in  an 
institutional  world  as  Institution-maker.  This 
reflection  of  itself  in  such  a  world  will  give  Art, 
Poetry,  Science,  which  we  shall  later  find  to  be 
the  leading  elements  of  the  Universal  Institute. 

The  two  worlds,  the  secular  and  the  religious, 
hitherto  unfolded  in  distinction,  are  then  to  be 
united  in  a  new  sphere,  in  which  both  are  to  be 
mirrored.  The  individual  is  to  see  himself  in  his 
movement  through  both ;  he  is  to  become  con- 
scious of  himself  in  his  institutional  process.  It 
is  no  longer  merely  the  Ego  as  Will  actualizing 
itself  in  these  two  kinds  of  Institutions,  secular 
and  relio^ious,  but  the  self-conscious  Eo:o  actual- 
izingitself  in  anew  Institution,  whose  very  object 
is  to  reveal  self-consciousness  in  its  creative  insti- 
tutional activity.  Spirit  thus  beholds  itself  in  its 
supreme  manifestation ;  the  Ego  contemplates  it- 
self in  its  highest  truth,  sees  itself  in  its  loftiest 
act  of  creativity,  being  the  contemplator  thereof, 
the  contemplated,  and  their  unity.  The  intellect, 
this  contemplative  element,  becomes  one  with  the 
movement  of  Will,  whose  present  function  is  to 
call  forth  and  organize  the  new  institutional 
world  just  for  the  purpose  of  self-contemplation 
and  self -revelation.  Thus  the  Ego  is  to  view  and 
to  know  itself  as  self-active  in  the  highest  form 
of  its  self-activity,  it  beholds  itself  making  Insti- 
tutions, its  supreme  creative  act. 

34 


630  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

We  may  notice  again,  passingly,  that  the  secu- 
lar and  religious  realms  have  two  eternal  forms 
of  self -reflection  in  what  are  called  the  Bibles  of 
Mankind,  which  are  divided  accordingly  into  two 
great  classes,  the  secularand  the  religious  Bibles, 
or  the  literary  and  the  sacred  Great  Books  of  the 
world.  Both  kinds  belong  to  and  are  phases  of 
the  Universal  Institute,  whose  function  is  in  the 
present  case  to  reveal  the  individual  to  himself  in 
his  final  highest  fulfillment;  both,  too,  utter  at 
last  the  same  fundamental  truth  of  man  to 
man. 

The  need  of  such  an  Institution  is  felt  from 
the  limitations  which  manifest  themselves  in  both 
the  secular  and  religious  spheres  as  heretofore 
unfolded.  Each  of  these  is  a  sphere  calling  forth 
the  active  powers  of  man;  each  produces  and 
cultivates  a  certain  kind  of  Will,  one  the  self- 
assertinof,  the  other  the  self-renunciatorv,  both 
being  worthy  and  necessary.  The  training 
of  both  is  essentially  a  will-training,  which  calls 
for  the  Deed.  But  man  is  not  only  a  doer,  but 
also  a  knower,  yea,  a  self-knower,  to  which  fact 
of  his  nature  there  must  be  an  Institution  cor- 
responding. 

This  is  our  present  sphere,  which  will  show  the 
Ego  not  only  as  institutional  but  beholding  itself 
as  institutional,  seeking  to  see  itself  in  all  its 
social,  political,  domestic,  and  religious  conflicts 
and    triumphs.     Art,  Literature,  Science     Phi- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  531 

losophy  are  primaril}'^  for  the  purpose  of  making 
the  Effo  self-seeino: ;  thus  the  Eo^o  creates  a 
world  in  which  to  mirror  itself  back  to  itself ; 
this  world  we  shall  find  to  be  an  institutional 
world,  in  which  the  Ego  embodies  itself  both  as 
self -active  and  self -contemplative,  as  both  Will 
and  Intellect. 

In  an  ancient  Greek  drama  of  great  power  and 
beauty,  the  king,  Creon,  as  the  head  of  the 
State,  commands  the  dead  body  of  the  traitor 
Polynices,  who  was  slain  fighting  against  his 
country,  to  be  cast  forth  without  the  rite  of 
burial,  to  the  beasts  and  birds  of  prey.  But 
Antigone,  the  sister  of  Polynices,  refuses  to  obey 
what  she  deems  an  unhallowed  command ;  she 
follows  the  instinct  of  the  Family,  of  sisterhood, 
and  buries  her  brother,  defying  the  ruler  of  the 
State  and  his  authority.  Manifestly  we  have 
here  an  institutional  conflict  between  the  sup- 
porters respectively  of  the  Family  and  the  State. 
Thus  before  the  Athenian  public,  the  poet  Sopho- 
cles presented  the  colliding  forces  which  form 
the  action  of  his  drama ;  in  essence  it  portrays 
the  conflict  between  two  secular  Institutions, 
which  conflict  is  thereby  brought  home  to  the 
consciousness  of  the  people  who  listen.  Into 
the  same  drama  the  religious  element  enters, 
though  perhaps  not  so  prominently;  Antigone 
appeals  to  the  subterranean  deities  of  instinct,  of 
feeling,  of  domestic  affection,  while  Creon  main- 


532  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

tains  the  Gods  of  the  Upperworld,  specially  of 
the  State. 

Plainly  this  drama  belongs  to  what  we  have 
called  the  Universal  Educative  Institution  whose 
function  is  to  reflect  the  life  of  man  in  its  secular 
and  religious  phases,  and  thereby  to  lift  him  up 
toward  institutional  freedom.  Such  is,  indeed, 
the  essence  of  Literature  in  its  highest  worth ;  it 
brings  out,  in  the  collision  of  characters  who  are 
its  representatives,  the  nature  and  the  limits  of 
all  Institutions,  in  the  present  case  Family  and 
State,  which  lie  very  near  to  every  human  soul. 
And  also  the  Greek  religion,  the  world  of  the 
Gods,  who  have  their  domestic  and  political  re- 
lationships, are  not  left  out.  Ultimately  ever}' 
great  drama,  and  every  great  dramatic  movement 
which  springs  from  the  heart  of  the  ages,  every 
great  dramatist  who  lives  and  is  worthy  of  life, 
notably  Shakespeare,  will  be  seen  to  rest  upon 
this  institutional  foundation,  and  to  unfold  in  his 
characters  the  collisions  of  Institutions. 

The  Ego  must,  by  the  very  necessity  of  its 
nature,  bring  to  consciousness  its  institutional 
realm,  both  secular  and  religious,  in  which  it  has 
its  spiritual  being;  the  Ego  must  know  itself  in 
its  highest  activity,  for  its  inherent  nature  is  to 
be  self-knowing  and  self-determining,  both  of 
which  characteristics  enter  into  the  Universal 
Institute.  Not  only  self-active  nmst  the  Ego  be, 
but   knowing   and    showing  itself  as  self -active,, 


TEE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  633 

revealing  itself  by  creating  for  this  purpose  a 
new  world,  also  institutional,  which,  being  the 
unity  of  the  Will  and  Intellect,  of  the  active  and 
the  speculative  principles  in  man,  we  have  named 
the  Universal  Institute,  with  the  suggestion,  also, 
of  its  educative  purpose. 

We  may  approach  this  thought  through  an- 
other illustration.  When  the  Greeks  narrated 
the  mythusof  Hercules,  they  told  how  he  drained 
swamps,  slew  serpents,  destroyed  wild  beasts  and 
birds,  conquered  and  killed  savage  men  and  mon- 
sters. Emphatically  is  he  the  institutional  hero 
of  Greece,  preparing  the  way  for  the  civilized 
life  of  man  in  Family  and  State,  and  rendering 
possible  all  culture.  What  did  the  Greeks  not 
see  reflected  back  to  themselves  in  his  story?  By 
means  of  it  they  became  aware  of  the  labors 
through  which  they  had  to  pass  in  order  to  attain 
their  institutional  existence ;  such  a  content  in 
their  mythus  they  must  feel  and  behold  in  order 
to  develop  it  and  themselves  to  maturity. 

Herein  we  may  note  that  Mythology  is  one 
form  or  stage  of  the  self-reflection  of  the  Ego, 
and  belongs  to  our  Universal  Institute,  which  is 
a  world  called  forth  by  the  Ego  to  mirror  itself 
as  institutional.  To  be  sure,  this  mythical  stage 
has  its  own  period  and  its  own  place  in  the  order 
of  the  present  sphere.  The  Mythus  is  the  peo- 
ple's primordial  attempt  at  self-revelation ;  they 
make  it,  this  first  picture  of  themselves,  more  or 


534  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

less  rude,  yet  it  is  the  rough  material  which  is  to 
be  trausfigured  into  the  greatest  poetry  of  the 
race. 

A  different  illustration  may  be  drawn  from  an- 
other source.  Raphael's  Sistine  Madonna  is  a 
painting  of  the  Mother  and  Child;  this  Child  is 
"the  son  of  God,"  and  the  bringer  of  a  new  re- 
ligious life  to  man.  Both  are  gazing  at  some- 
thing not  painted  on  the  canvas,  something  not 
visible,  possibly  not  formable,  hence  not  to  be 
painted.  Gazing  at  the  Invisible,  we  may  sup- 
pose, "  seeing  God;  "  wherein  Art  points  sig- 
nificantly to  that  which  is  beyond  Art.  In  such 
a  picture  the  Ego  has  the  supreme  religious  act, 
the  vision  of  the  Unseen,  brought  to  conscious- 
ness by  a  simple  look.  The  beholder  beholds 
the  Mother  and  Chikl  beholding,  and  gets  an  in- 
timation of  what  the}'"  behold  in  their  counte- 
nances and  attitudes;  thus  the  Ego  participates  in 
the  Divine  through  the  work  of  Art. 

Painting,  then,  is  a  phase  or  part  of  the  Uni- 
versal Institute,  since  in  the  present  case  it  re- 
flects back  into  the  soul  of  the  spectator  an 
element  of  the  religious  Institutional  World. 
All  Art,  we  shall  find,  belongs  to  the  same 
sphere,  since  it  is  a  self-reflection  of  the  Ego  in 
some  of  its  social  or  institutional  activities,  with 
an  ultimate  educative  end.  We  can  also  take 
an  illustration  from  written  History.  That  of 
Herodotus,   for   example,  may  be  regarded  as  a 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  636 

vast  reflector  which,  being  held  up  before  the 
Greek  race,  helped  them  mightily  to  come  to  a 
consciousness  of  what  they  were,  and  of  what 
they  were  capable  of  doing,  casting  upon  the 
future  a  colossal  image  of  their  destiny,  and,  in 
fact,  of  the  destiny  of  Europe  and  the  Occident. 
The  deed  of  Marathon  showed  the  Athenians 
what  they  could  do,  but  the  historical  account  of 
Marathon  and  also  of  Salamis,  as  given  by  the 
historian,  made  them  conscious  of  their  worth 
and  perpetuated  their  heroic  action  through  all 
time.  Moreover  this  Athenian  spirit,  aware  of 
itself  and  determined  to  see  itself  to  the  full, 
began  to  reproduce  itself  in  architecture,  sculp- 
ture, painting,  poetry,  history,  science,  phi- 
losophy —  all  of  them  forms  called  forth  by  the 
Ego  seeking  a  complete  utterance  and  reflection 
of  itself.  Thus  the  Athenian  people  had  not 
only  their  secular  and  religious  Institutions,  and 
defended  the  same  in  action,  but  they  also  created 
their  Universal  Institution  profoundly  educative 
for  themselves  and  for  all  time  the  most  wonder- 
ful product  of  their  civilization,  verily  their 
ofreatest  Deed,  greater  even  than  Marathon  and 
Salamis. 

In  such  fashion  the  Ego,  as  self -knowing  and 
self-determined,  completes  itself,  or,  using  the 
term  employed  for  this  purpose,  makes  itself 
universal  in  an  Institution.  It  creates  a  new  in- 
stitutional life    or    sphere  whose   function  is  to 


536  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

reveal  the  Ego  to  itself  as  institutional.  Again 
we  may  note  that  Intellect  and  Will  unite  in  one 
supreme  process ;  the  "Will  actualizes  itself  in  an 
institutional  form  whose  purpose  and  content  are 
to  reveal  the  Self  as  institutional  and  as  the 
maker  of  Institutions.  Many  are  the  kinds  of 
this  self-revelation,  quite  as  many  as  there  are 
diversified  activities  of  the  Ego,  which  are, 
therefore,  to  be  ordered  by  its  fundamental  form 
of  activity,  the  Psychosis. 

Already  it  has  been  observed  that  the  educa- 
tive Institution  is  the  third  stage  of  the  entire 
sweep  of  the  institutional  Psychosis,  tlie  other 
two  stages  being  the  secular  and  the  religious. 
It  is,  therefore,  essentially  a  return ;  the  indi- 
vidual Ego  comes  back  to  itself  completelv 
through  a  new  institutional  world  which  it 
must  not  only  produce  or  recreate,  but  must 
also  think  or  contemplate.  The  Ego  as  Will, 
as  often  noted,  has  a  fundamental  scission  with- 
in itself,  must  separate  itself  internally  and 
then  externalize  itself.  In  the  two  previous  in- 
stitutional spheres,  the  secular  and  the  religious, 
there  was  an  actualization  of  the  AVill  as  "Will,  but 
now  in  this  third  stage  of  the  Educative  Institu- 
tion, the  Ego  as  Will  actualizes  itself  for  the 
purpose  of  knowing  itself  as  this  process  of  self- 
actualization.  Thus  the  Ego  becomes  conscious 
of  itself  as  institutional,  wherein  lies  its  return, 
its  movement  out  of  the  separation  of  the  Will 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  637 

into  the  unity  of  the  Intellect,  into  the  beholding 
and  recognizing  itself  as  this  institutional  process. 

Thus  rises  on  our  vision  the  realm  of  Art  in  the 
widest  sense  of  the  term ;  the  Universal  Educative 
Institution  is  truly  the  Art- World.  The  indi- 
vidual Ego  as  artist  creates  a  product  whose  con- 
tent is  the  revelation  of  the  Universal  Will  as 
creative,  or  the  Divine  Ego  as  supreme  Maker  or 
as  the  absolute  Artist.  But  this  work  of  Art, 
be  it  a  statue  or  picture,  or  poem,  a  symphony 
or  a  philosophy,  exists  not  for  its  own  sake  or 
for  mere  beauty's  sake;  it  has  its  end  in  the 
people  who  through  it  are  brought  to  behold  and 
to  participate  in  the  creative  activity  of  the 
Divine  Self,  whereby  they  become  truly  Godlike. 
This  Art- World  is,  therefore,  educative,  and 
exists  ultimately  for  the  Education  of  Man- 
kind toward  its  goal,  namely,  freedom.  More- 
over, this  freedom  can  be  made  actual  only 
through  an  Institution;  accordingly  the  Art- 
World  in  its  highest  manifestation  is  institutional, 
indeed  doubly  so,  since  it  is  an  Institution  whose 
object  is  to  be  forever  keeping  alive  and  re- 
creating Institutions  in  the  human  Ego,  which 
thereby  itself  becomes  creative  of  Institutions. 

Tlie  Three  Egos.  The  reader  may  have 
noticed  in  the  preceding  exposition  that  three 
Egos  have  been  implied,  all  in  a  process  with  one 
another.  There  is  the  humanly  creative  Ego,  as 
genius  or  artist,  creating  his  work;  then  there  is 


538  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

the  divinely  creative  Ego,  with  His  work,  which 
is  not  simply  to  be  copied  or  imitated,  but  is  to 
be  re-created,  along  with  its  Creator  creating  it ; 
thirdly,  there  is  the  recipient  Ego,  who  is  to  see 
and  think  the  work  of  the  genius  or  artist,  and 
thereby  be  made  to  share  in  the  divinely  creative 
spirit  of  the  universe  just  through  this  work. 
Such  is  the  function  of  Art  in  the  present  broad 
sense;  thus  it  is  truly  educative,  training  the 
human  race  into  its  heritage  of  Institutions.  So 
it  comes  that  the  man  of  genius  is  the  new 
Teacher,  teaching  in  the  "World-School,  not  hired 
by  but  commanded  by  his  Master,  the  World- 
Spirit,  to  perform  just  this  task,  usually  without 
salary,  and  often  at  the  cost  of  life. 

These  three  Egos  we  may  consider  somewhat 
more  closely,  first  in  distinction  from  one  an- 
other, and  then  in  their  relation  and  interaction. 

1.  At  the  start  we  shall  turn  our  look  toward 
the  maker  of  this  new  world,  the  genius  or  cre- 
ative Ego,  who  as  Artist,  Poet,  Thinker,  calls  it 
out  of  the  void  into  being.  His  is  the  original 
energy,  the  Conception  as  generative;  he  pro- 
jects himself  into  the  object,  transforms  it  with 
his  Idea,  therein  manifesting  both  his  Will  and 
his  Intellect,  creating  his  work  through  insight 
as  well  as  action.  For  he  must  see  something, 
the  mere  inner  vision  of  which  he  feels  neces- 
sitated to  throw  out  of  himself  into  an  external 
shape.     What  does    he    see    and    thus    project? 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  539 

Not  some  caprice  of  his  own,  not  simply  a  reflec- 
tion of  his  individual  Self ;  his  work  must  mirror 
and  bring  to  manifestation  the  Self  as  universal, 
we  may  call  it  the  divine  Self  in  its  act  of  calling 
forth  some  phase  of  the  Universiil  Institute,  and 
therein  revealing  itself  to  man.  Let  this  creative 
Ego  be  Homer  with  his  battle  of  the  Gods ;  what 
lies  iniao;ed  therein?  The  conflict  between  the 
Greek  and  Trojan  institutional  worlds,  even  the 
grand  struo:o;le  of  the  as:es,  that  between  Orient 
and  Occident;  and  every  old  Greek  hearer  of 
the  poem  felt  that  struggle  surging  through  his 
soul,  though  the  modern  reader  may  deem  it 
merely  some  mythological  fancy-work  gotten  up 
for  amusement.  Or  let  it  be  the  thought  of  the 
Eads  bridge  Spanning  the  Mississippi;  there  is 
first  the  individual  Ego  as  builder,  creator ;  but 
he  must  think  the  thouo;ht  of  the  divine  Ego  as 
manifested  in  Nature  and  her  laws,  reproduc- 
ing them  and  applying  them  in  his  structure. 
That  is,  he  must  realize  Science,  and  Science,  as 
we  shall  see,  is  a  phase  or  branch  of  the  Universal 
Institute. 

In  the  next  place  this  creative  Ego,  as  genius 
or  maker,  has  various  activities ;  it  must  separate 
itself  into  the  psychical  elements  of  Intellect.  It 
will,  therefore,  manifest  itself  as  Sense-percep- 
tion, Representation  and  Thought,  all  of  which 
become  specially  productive,  bringing  forth  an 
objective  world  which  we  shall  now  consider. 


540  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

2.  We  have  thus  reached  that  which  the  crea- 
tive Ego  as  genius  has  projected  out  of  itself  as 
its  product  or  creation —  work  of  art,  poem,  em- 
bodied idea,  It  has  undoubtedly  the  stamp  of 
the  genius  of  the  individual  Ego  which  conceived 
and  brought  it  forth  to  daylight;  but  it  also 
bears  in  itself  the  reflection  or  the  suggestion  of 
another  Self,  the  universal  one,  whose  semblance 
must  be  felt  or  witnessed  in  the  particular  work 
or  deed  portrayed.  Frequently  we  call  this 
higher  universal  Self  by  the  name  of  World- 
Spirit,  which  seems  at  certain  periods  to  seize 
upon  the  individual,  and  compel  him  to  the  utter- 
ance of  itself,  who  thereby  becomes  the  genius,  as 
poet,  seer,  artist,  thinker,  maker,  whose  function 
it  is  to  call  into  being  the  uttered^  that  the  Ego 
may  behold  itself  in  the  same,  and  thus  be  made 
aware  of  itself  in  its  supreme  manifestation. 
Such  a  work  is  not  only  a  product  of  the  Will, 
but  is  an  actualization  of  the  Will,  hence  bears 
in  itself  an  institutional  principle,  whose  object  is 
to  reflect  just  this  actualization  of  the  Will.  The 
entire  present  realm  of  creative  works  we  have 
already  designated  as  the  Universal  Educative 
Institution,  looking  at  it  on  the  institutional 
side,  which  is  now  our  point  of  view;  but  it 
may  likewise  be  called  the  Art-world  in  the 
broadest  meaning  of  the  term. 

This  Art-world  is  therefore  the  product  of  an 
Ego,  and  reveals  the   spiritual  semblance  of  an 


THE  EDUCATJVE  INSTITUTION.  541 

Ego ;  consequently  it  will  divide  itself  according 
to  the  psychical  process  of  the  Ego  into  three 
grand  divisions  of  Arts  —  the  Presentative,  the 
Representative,  and  the  Noetic  —  which  corre- 
spond to  and  are  based  on  the  three  stages  of 
mind  previously  designated,  namely.  Sense-per- 
ception, Eepresentation,  and  Thought  {jSFous). 

Such,  then,  is  the  general  organization  of 
this  objective  realm  of  the  spirit's  products;  the 
Ego  calls  it  forth  and  organizes  it,  hence  it  bears 
in  itself  the  \erj  impress  of  the  movement  of  the 
Ego,  the  Psychosis. 

But,  having  gotten  the  Art-world  of  works 
projected  into  externality,  we  may  now  turn  awa}' 
from  the  creator  and  the  created,  from  the  genius 
and  his  product,  to  those  who  are  to  take  it  up 
into  their  souls,  and  for  whom  the  work  has  been 
done. 

3.  Here  we  come  to  the  recipient  Ego  and  its 
activity,  to  the  spectator,  hearer,  reader;  to  the 
people  in  whose  spirit  this  objective  world  of 
products  is  to  plant  its  meaning  and  to  bring  home 
to  their  particular  selves  consciousness  of  their 
universal  Selfhood.  All  the  before-mentioned 
Arts  —  Presentative,  Representative,  Noetic  — 
are  the  creations  of  the  individual  Ego  (as 
genius),  embodjing  in  some  form  the  universal 
Ego  (as  Spirit  of  the  Age,  or  as  World-Spirit,  or 
also  as  the  Divine  Spirit),  which  is  thus  imparted 
to  the  recipient  Ego,  which  Ego  thereby  partici- 


542  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

pates  in  and  gets  conscious  of  its  greater  and 
higher  Self.  Here  lies  the  grand  end  of  this 
stao;e  of  the  Educative  Institution:  the  Eo^o 
seeing,  knowing,  contemplating,  sharing  in  and 
living  in  the  divine  and  universal  principle  of 
itself,  which  it  attains  unto  chiefly  through  what 
we  have  above  called  the  Art-world,  or  the  Uni- 
versal Institute  in  its  total  circuit.  Hence  this 
Institution  is  educative  in  the  supreme  sense. 

The  recipient  Ego  has,  however,  three  ways  or 
methods  of  beholding  and  communing  with  the 
divine  or  universal  principle  of  itself  which  has 
been  just  mentioned.  The  first  way  is  the  im- 
mediate one,  b}^  direct  vision  or  intuition,  and  by 
the  spontaneous  feeling  of  communion  and  one- 
ness. The  second  way  is  that  of  mediation,  and 
is  the  road  Avhich  the  vast  majority  of  mortals 
have  to  travel,  and  which  leads  through  the  Art- 
world  in  its  three  forms  —  Presentative,  Repre- 
sentative, and  Noetic.  Then  there  is  the  third 
way,  the  most  perfect  yet  probably  the  most 
difficult,  which  has  been  usually  named  Phi- 
losophy. That  is,  the  Ego  as  Thinker  not  onlv 
creates  Philosophy  (or  Science)  of  itself,  which 
is  the  Noetic  Art  in  general,  but  turns  it  back 
upon  the  preceding  stages  and  gives  their  Phi- 
losophy, which  is  their  creative  Thought.  Thus 
we  have  a  Philosophy  (or  Science)  of  the  Pre- 
sentative Arts,  usually  called  Aesthetics;  also  a 
Philosophy  (or  Science)  of  the  Representative 


TEE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  543 

Arts — Poetics;  finally  a  Philosophy  of  the  Noetic 
Arts,  or  the  Science  of  Sciences,  (called  by  the 
schoolmen  'icientia  scientiarum),vi!\i\c\i\\f{^  been 
claimed  to  be  absolute  Science,  knowing  itself 
and  knowino;  all  other  knowledge  throuojh  know- 
ing  itself.  This  last  domain  often  goes  by  tlie 
name  of  Metaphysics,  which,  with  Aesthetics  and 
Poetics,  embraces  the  three  Philosophies  of  the 
three  kinds  of  Art.  But  this  part  of  the  subject 
will  be  developed  later  on. 

In  the  three  phases  of  activity  just  set  forth, 
we  may  designate  more  strictly  the  Psychosis : 
first  is  the  individual  Ego  as  creative,  the  genius 
or  genetic  energy ;  second  is  the  object  created, 
separated  from  the  creating  Ego  and  projected 
into  the  world,  which,  however,  reflects  not  only 
the  Self  as  individual,  but  as  universal,  divine, 
wherein  lies  the  twof oldness  of  the  work ;  third 
is  the  recipient  Ego  returning  to  and  uniting 
with  the  creative  Ego  in  its  creation,  and  thereby 
communing  not  only  with  it  but  also  with  the 
universal  Ego,  which  is  the  objective,  world- 
creating  principle  embodied  in  the  work. 

Thus  we  begin  to  catch  the  outlines  of  what 
is  here  called  the  Universal  Institute,  which  is 
always  reproducing  itself  and  yet  always  advanc- 
ing^ beyond  its  old  limits,  throuoh  making  nian 
conscious  of  its  movement.  It  reflects  him  not 
only  in  his  secular  and  religious  spheres,  but 
reflects   him   reflectinsf   himself   therein:    he    is 


544  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

limit-transcending,  knows  himself  to  be  such, 
and  the  Institution  which  reflects  him  truly  must 
show  the  same  character.  Hence  the  Universal 
Educative  Institution  is  always  in  the  process  of 
going  forward  in  order  to  come  to  itself,  self- 
transcending  yet  just  therein  self-realiziug,  reach- 
ing fulfillment  by  forever  taking  the  next  step. 

It  w^ill  be  observed  that  this  entire  sphere  we 
call  Art,  or  the  Art- world,  giving  to  the  terra  a 
wider  range  than  its  ordinary  sense  of  Fine  Arts, 
which  are  embraced  ia  the  first  division  below 
(the  Presentative  Arts).  For  the  Ego  now  pro- 
duces a  work  which  embodies  in  some  form  the 
divinely  creative  principle ;  this  work  we  call  in 
its  widest  acceptation  a  work  of  Art.  All  Art, 
moreover,  teaches,  and  is  not  merely  something 
to  be  taught ;  educative  it  is,  and  belongs  to  the 
Educative  Institution.  Then  the  content  of  Art 
is  ultimately  divine,  imparting  the  knowledge  of 
God;  Art's  function  is  to  lead  the  world-con- 
sciousness to  the  God-consciousness,  filling  and 
transfio-urinoj  the  human  with  the  divine.  Herein 
we  may  see  its  relation  to  the  religious  Institution. 

The  principle  of  ordering  these  Arts  will  be 
the  movement  of  the  Intellect  in  creating  them 
on  the  one  hand  and  in  appropriating  them  on 
the  other.  Accordingly  we  shall  behold  the 
Psychosis  of  the  Intellect  organizing  the  present 
sphere  as  follows :  — 

I.    The  Presentative  Arts;  these  are  the  Sense- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  546 

Arts,  in  which  the  creative  Ego  as  artist  projects 
into  the  forms  of  Sense-perception  the  universal 
spiritual  content  of  itself,  which  is  the  divinely 
creative  Ego  ;  and  this  spiritual  content  is  in  turn 
taken  up  and  appropriated  by  the  recipient  Ego 
through  its  Sense-perception  (Painting,  for  in- 
stance, through  Sight,  and  Music  through  Hear- 
ing). 

Then  the  E20  as  Thinker,  seizing  in  Thought 
and  ordering  through  the  same  the  universal  con- 
tent  of  the  Presentative  Arts,  produces  a  science 
of  them  —  Aesthetics. 

In  the  Presentative  Arts  Nature  is  immediately 
given  as  divinely  created,  and  then  is  wrought 
over  by  the  artistic  Ego  into  material  forms 
which  reveal  the  divinely  active  Ego  in  its  crea- 
tive supremacy. 

II.  Itepresentative  Arts;  these  are  the  Image- 
Arts,  in  which  the  creative  Ego  as  artist  (or  poet) 
projects  into  the  forms  of  Representation,  that 
is,  into  images,  the  universal  spiritual  content  of 
itself  which  is  the  divinely  creative  Ego  ;  and  this 
spiritual  content  is  in  turn  taken  up  and  appro- 
priated by  the  recipient  Ego  through  its  Repre- 
sentation, or  image-making  power,  which  utters 
itself  in  the  Word  (Poetry,  Belles-Lettres) 

Then  the  Ego  as  Thinker,  seizing  in  Thought, 
and  ordering  through  the  same  this  universal 
content  of  the  Representative  Arts  produces  a 
science  of  them —  Poetics. 

85 


646  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

In  the  Representative  Arts  it  is  the  copy  of 
Nature  taken  by  the  Ego  (the  image)  and 
uttered  in  the  "Word,  which  is  seized  upon  and 
wrought  over  by  the  poetic  Ego  for  the  purpose 
of  revealing  tlie  divinely  creative  Ego  in  works 
of  the  Imagination.  The  total  Poem,  as  the 
Iliad,  is  at  last  one  huge  Image. 

III.  Noetic  Aris;  these  are  the  Thought-Arts, 
in  which  the  creative  Ego  as  Thinker  projects 
into  the  forms  of  Thought  (abstract  categories) 
the  universal  spiritual  content  of  itself,  which  is 
the  divinely  creative  Ego ;  and  this  spiritual  con- 
tent is  in  turn  taken  up  and  appropriated  by  the 
recipient  Ego  through  its  Thinking. 

Then  the  Ego  as  Thinker  seizing  in  Thought 
and  ordering  through  the  same  this  universal 
content  of  the  Noetic  Arts  produces  a  science  of 
them  — Metaphysics. 

In  the  present  field  Art  and  Science  fall  to- 
gether. So  we  place  under  the  Noetic  Arts  the 
Sciences  of  Nature,  History,  and  Philosophy. 
The  humanly  creative  Ego  as  Thinker  seizes  and 
utters  the  divinely  creative  process  of  the  absolute 
Ego  in  Nature,  in  History,  and  in  Thought  itself 
through  the  pure  forms  of  Thought. 

Still  these  pure  forms  of  Thought  or  categories, 
being  ordered  into  a  system  with  its  one  central 
principle  or  Thought,  are  not  final,  since  they 
with  their  system  fall  into  Time,  which  thus 
brings  forth   a   series    of   philosophic   systems: 


,    THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  547 

for  unifying-  which  a  new  order  must  be  estab- 
lished. 

Such  are  the  three  divisions  of  the  Arts 
whicli  are  chissed,  according  to  their  fundamen- 
tal characteristic,  under  the  Educative  Institu- 
tion, as  their  supreme  object  is  educative,  namely, 
a  training  of  the  race  (the  recipient  Ego)  into  a 
consciousness  of  its  divine  principle,  which  is  the 
absolute  Free-Will  which  wills Free-Will.  Hence 
the  education  given  by  Art  is  ultimately  the  edu- 
cation of  man  into  freedom. 

Moreover  it  will  be  noticed  that  the  grround  of 
the  division  of  these  Arts  into  Presentative,  Rep- 
resentative and  Noetic  is  found  in  the  Ego,  which 
as  genius  or  genetic  creates,  and  as  recipient  appro- 
priates, these  Arts.  Hence  they  conform  directly 
to  the  movement  of  the  Psychology  of  the  Intel- 
lect whose  divisions  are  Sense-perception,  Rep- 
resentation, and  Thought.  (See  onv  Psijcholog^ 
and  Psycliosis,  p.  54,  426,  et  passim.) 

Still  further,  they  are  a  production  of  the 
Will  with  a  divine  or  absolute  content,  and  so  we 
call  them  Arts,  being  herein  different  from  other 
productions  of  the  Will  with  a  merely  human 
content,  which  is  usually  some  finite  means  for 
some  finite  end. 

Next  we  shall  proceed  to  give  a  few  details 
about  these  three  stages  of  the  Art-world,  Avhich 
follow  the  psychical  order  of  the  Ego  in  dealing 
with    Percept,   Image,  Thought.     At   the    same 


548  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

time  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  this  Art- world 
being  supremely  educative,  is  the  Universal  Edu- 
cative Institution,  which  last  word  adds  the  fact 
that  it  is  likewise  institutional.  Anything  like 
a  full  development  of  this  Institution  cannot  be 
here  attempted ;  our  reader  must  for  the  present 
do  without  any  unfolding  of  the  negative  and 
evolutionary  stages  of  this  sphere,  though  we 
shall  seek  to  give  the  main  connectinoj  lines  of 
the  positive  principle  of  the  Art-world. 

I.  The  Presentative  Arts. 

This  designation  has  been  chosen  inasmuch  as 
the  created  object  is  immediately  present  to  the 
senses  of  the  observer  on  the  one  hand,  while, 
on  the  other,  the  artist  sees  the  Divine  Ego  in 
the  same  immediate  form,  and  proceeds  to  em- 
body it  for  the  senses  of  the  observer,  projecting 
it  out  of  himself  into  reality.  The  present  sphere 
of  the  Art-world  or  of  the  Univeisal  Institute 
occupies,  accordingly,  the  field  of  what  is  known 
in  psychology  as  Sense-perception,  in  which  the 
external  object  is  taken  up  and  appropriated  by 
the  Ego  through  the  senses. 

In  a  simple  sensation  already  there  is  a  the- 
istic  element,  when  we  reach  down  into  the 
depths  of  it.  I  can  see  yonder  tree  only  by  re- 
producing it  through  an  act  of  my  creative  Ego, 
which  is  truly  the  image  and  counterpart  of  the 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  549 

universal  creative  Ego .  ' '  "We  see  all  things  in 
God,"  said  Malebranche,  giving  utterance  to  the 
divine  side  of  a  simple  act  of  vision.  But  my 
Ego  does  not  in  sensation  alone  make  the  divinely 
creative  element  explicit ;  this  is  just  the  func- 
tion of  Art  and  of  the  artist ;  he  is  to  transform 
the  object  of  sensation  that  it  suggest  to  the 
Ego  of  the  hearer  or  beholder  the  divinely  cre- 
ative Ego  in  its  process.  He  takes  the  external 
sensuous  thing,  say,  a  piece  of  marble,  digging- 
it  out  of  its  dark  abode  in  the  mountain,  where 
the  creative  power  of  Nature  put  it ;  then  he  pro- 
ceeds to  make  over  that  piece  of  marble  in  a  new 
creation,  whose  supreme  function  is  to  reflect  and 
to  bring  to  the  consciousness  of  the  beholder  just 
that  original  creative  power  of  the  world  in  some 
of  its  manifestations.  When  you  merely  see  the 
block  of  stone,  it  has  no  explicit  suggestion  of 
its  own  generative  principle ;  but  in  a  temple  or 
in  a  statue  it  is  endowed  with  a  new  capacity ;  it 
speaks  to  the  beholder,  to  the  recipient  Ego,  of 
the  Ego  as  creative,  as  world-maker,  and  calls 
the  former  to  witness  a  divine  epiphany  in  some 
visible  outward  shape.  So  the  object  is  beauti- 
ful in  the  worthiest  sense,  manifesting  a  supreme 
spiritual  harmony  of  man  with  the  divine,  and 
calling  forth  the  highest  act  of  the  beholder  in 
viewing  the  divinely  creative  act. 

We  may,  therefore,  say  that  it  is  the  destiny 
of  every  object  of  Sense-perception  to  be  made 


550  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

over,  to  be  re-created  by  Art,  to  the  end  that  it 
manifest  directly  the  semblance  of  the  Divine 
Ego  which  originally  created  that  object.  This 
is  more  particularly  the  field  of  the  so-called  Fine 
Arts,  here  designated  as  Presentative  Arts  in 
accordance  with  their  psychological  character- 
istic. The  artist,  by  the  immediate  fiat  of  his 
genius  projects  into  some  responsive  sensuou- 
material  the  Great  Ego,  and  thus  is  call- 
ing forth  the  Art-world  or  some  phase  thereof. 
In  the  reahn  of  sensation  we  have  the  ac- 
tivities of  the  five  senses,  whose  function  is  to 
take  up  and  internalize  the  external  object. 
But  not  all  of  these  five  senses  are  suitable  for 
Art,  at  least  not  all  of  them  are  equally  suit- 
able. The  sense  of  Touch  is  too  special  in  its 
working ;  it  particularizes  very  nicely  and  in 
great  detail,  but  it  or  the  mind  after  it  has  little 
power  of  synthesis ;  hence  we  can  hardly  reach 
the  totality  of  an  artistic  product,  and  still 
less  the  Beautiful  thereof,  through  palpation. 
Taste  and  Smell  are  often  called  the  chemical 
senses,  and  imply  the  object  not  in  its  totality 
but  in  its  dissolution.  Cookery  and  perfumery 
have  been  claimed  to  be  Fine  Arts,  occupying  a 
pretty  little  corner  somewhere ;  but  we  cannot 
look  into  that  corner  now,  however  appetizing 
and  fraorant.  Sioht  and  Hearing  are  the  Art- 
senses,  at  least  the  most  perfect  ones,  and  to 
them  we  shall  confine  ourselves,  since  through 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  551 

them  we  are  able  to  get  the  reflection  of  the 
Ego  as  universal.  Sight  can  receive  a  totality 
in  Space  through  its  medium  of  light;  Hear- 
ing can  receive  a  totality  in  Time  through  its 
medium  of  sound.  In  Art  the  sensuous  material 
must  be  filled  with  the  spirit,  the  real  must  be 
infused  with  the  ideal ;  both  elements,  the  real 
and  the  ideal,  must  be  transmitted  to  the  senses 
which  can  take  up  both,  through  their  media, 
light  and  sound,  which  again  have  something 
responsively  ideal  even  in  their  physical  prop- 
erties. Such ,  then,  are  the  two  Art-senses,  through 
which  mainly  the  sense-world  of  Nature  is  to  be 
transformed  into  the  sense-world  of  Art,  and 
thus  become  a  phase  or  a  division  of  the  Universal 
Institute. 

In  the  realm  of  the  Fine  Arts,  here  called 
Presentative,  we  shall  observe  a  movement,  a 
Psychosis,  inasmuch  as  they  show  the  Ego  work- 
ing itself  out  to  completeness  in  the  sphere  of 
sensation.  The  transformation  of  the  sense- 
world  of  Nature  into  the  sense-world  of  Art  is 
accomplished  by  the  creative  Ego  of  the  artist 
for  the  recii)ient  Ego  of  the  people  in  order  to 
reveal  the  universal,  divinely  creative  Ego  as  the 
principle  or  spirit  generating  the  institutional 
world.  The  three  stages  of  this  process  of  trans- 
formation we  shall  designate  briefly  in  advance. 

I.  Somatic  Arts,  which  are  sometimes  called 
Arts  of  Form,  show  the  immediate  transforma- 


562  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS, 

tion  of  the  sensuous  object  into  the  artistic  object. 
Usually  the  physical  organism  is  seized  by  the 
plastic  artist  and  remoulded  for  the  expression 
of  the  spirit.  Though  the  form  be  transformed, 
it  still  remains  in  immediate  unity  with  its 
meaning. 

II.  Architecture;  the  artistic  Ego  now  sepa- 
rates the  spirit  from  the  form  and  builds  the 
latter,  transforms  it  into  an  inclosure  for  spirit 
and  reflecting  spirit.  Architecture,  therefore, 
has  in  it  the  separative  principle,  being  in  its 
highest  manifestation  the  house  of  the  universal 
Ego,  of  the  world-creative  power,  whose  dwelling 
place  must  suggest  its  presence. 

III.  Music;  the  fixed  space-world  passes  into 
a  time-world,  which  has  sound  as  its  content, 
whose  musical  character  is  a  continuous  going 
forth,  yet  is  also  a  continuous  self -return.  The 
architectural  forms  which  seem  crystallized,  and 
remain  in  a  state  of  separation,  start  to  moving 
in  music  and  complete  themselves  in  its  process. 
The  musical  artist  takes  as  his  material  not 
merely  sound  but  self -returning  sound  which  is 
the  elemental  principle  of  harmony,  and  employs 
it  to  give  utterance  to  the  Divine  Ego. 

The  division  into  inner  and  outer  is  implicit  in 
the  Somatic  Arts,  whose  Spirit  is  immediately 
manifested  in  the  Bodv ;  but  in  Architecture  the 
distinction  into  inner  and  outer  becomes  explicit, 
and  even  visible  when  the  material  form  itself 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  ;"jo3 

separates  into  the  inner  and  outer  (the  statue  and 
temple) ;  while  in  Music  there  is  a  continual 
movement  of  the  material  (sound-waves)  to  the 
inner,  to  the  Self  which  is  stirred  to  its  inner 
elemental  activity  through  the  outer  tone.  Thus 
Ave  have  in  the  Presentative  Arts  the  three  stages 
of  the  Psychosis. 

A\'e  have,  accordingly,  to  start  with  the  So- 
matic Arts  as  being  the  first  and  most  immediate 
forms  of  artistic  Presentation.  They  take  up 
and  make  over  the  whole  realm  of  external  Na- 
ture, but  they  necessarily  will  seek  a  selection  of 
those  objects  which  are  most  suitable  and  lie 
nearest  at  hand  for  the  purpose  of  Self-expres- 
sion. Living  organisms  are  better  in  this  regard 
than  inorganic  things,  while  the  best  of  all  is  the 
human  body.  Hence  the  Somatic  Arts  concen- 
trate about  the  human  body,  endeavoring  through 
it  to  give  some  utterance  or  adumbration  of  the 
divinely  creative  Ego. 

The  grounds  for  thus  selecting  the  highest 
visible  object  to  express  the  invisible  are  mani- 
fest. The  human  organism  is  not  only  the  home 
but  the  organ  of  the  spirit,  that  through  which 
it  acts  and  therein  utters  itself.  Moreover  it  is 
the  outer  sensible  manifestation  of  the  Ego  itself, 
of  the  Psychosis,  whose  process  it  suggests  in  an 
immediate  visible  form.  Look  at  it;  first,  it  is 
(jne,  in  simple  direct  unity  with  itself,  bounded 
in  Space  and  Time,  being  itself  and  nothing  else. 


554  SOCIAL  LVSTITUTIOXS. 

Look  at  it  again;  it  is,  in  the  second  place, 
divided  within  itself,  it  is  composed  of  two  sym- 
metrical lialves,  not  mere  repetitions  of  each 
other,  but  mutualh^  related  and  complementary. 
The  third  grlance  will  reveal  the  fact  that  these 
two  halves  not  only  make  one  external  whole, 
but  constitute  one  process  together,  which  pro- 
cess is  called  life,  and  is  the  inner  ideal  principle 
of  the  total  organism. 

Thus  it  is  that  the  Human  Body,  even  in  its 
physical  aspect,  is  not  only  the  home  and  the 
organ  of  the  spirit,  but  is  the  closest,  most 
cognate  and  exalted  natural  symbol  of  the  Ego 
itself  in  its  own  inner  process.  Let  us  note 
again  that  two-sidedness  of  the  body,  called  by 
physiologists  its  bi-lateral  symmetry ;  draw  the 
median  line  from  your  forehead,  down  your 
nose  and  throat,  along  your  chest ;  do  you  not  see 
that  your  framework  is  two  in  order  to  be  one 
and  a  process?  Such  is  the  outer  appearance 
of  yourself,  that  is,  of  your  very  Self;  it  is  the 
image  of  your  Ego  made  external,  made  by 
Nature  into  an  object  of  sense;  trul}^  do  you 
name  it  the  Body  of  your  Ego,  the  actual  in- 
carnation of  your  Selfhood. 

Still,  the  Human  Body  is  to  be  reproduced 
and  made  over  out  of  Nature  into  Art.  Though, 
even  physically,  it  be  a  marvelous  picture  of  the 
Ego,  it  is  that  of  the  particular,  finite,  sense- 
involved    Eo-o.     Hence  the   ffenius  as  artist  will 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  555 

transform  the  Body,  recreating  it  in  a  t?ensuous 
material,  which  thereby  becomes  a  new  and  pure 
image  of  the  universal  Ego,  of  the  divinely 
creative  Self. 

I.  The  Somatic  Arts.  We  here  employ  a 
term  which  signifies  literally  the  Arts  of  the 
Bod}'  (^soma  in  Greek),  or  of  the  immediate  mate- 
rial form,  which  is  to  present  the  artistic  content 
to  vision.  The  outer  and  the  inner  are  here  un- 
dividedly  one  in  the  sensuous  object ;  later  in 
Architecture  we  shall  see  the  separation  of  these 
two  elements. 

The  Somatic  Arts  are  in  three  divisions,  which 
constitute  a  process  among  themselves.  First 
are  the  Plastic  Artu  represented  by  Sculpture, 
which  reproduce  the  material  form  in  its  three 
dimensions  —  length,  breadth  and  thickness  — 
or  as  it  is  immediately  given  by  nature.  Second 
are  the  Graphic  Arts,  represented  by  Painting 
and  Drawing,  which  reproduce  the  material  form 
throuo-h  the  abstract  mao-nitudes  —  surface,  line 
and  point  —  which  are  abstractions  from  the  con- 
crete fullness  of  Nature.  Third  are  the  Kinetic 
Arts,  in  which  the  material  form  moves  from 
within,  and  thus  is  endued  with  life,  through 
which  movements  the  living  Body  produces  ani- 
mated pictures  which  can  have  the  content  of 
Art.  This  stage  is  represented  in  many  grada- 
tions, from  the  simple  gesture  to  the  compli- 
cated figures  of  the  dance  and  ballet. 


556  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Thus  we  put  together  the  Plastic,  Graphic  and 
Kinetic  Arts  in  one  psychical  movement,  which 
starts  with  the  material  form  in  the  immediate 
concrete  fullness  of  nature,  as  in  the  statue,  and 
then  passes  to  the  abstract  (abstracted,  separated, 
and  hence  the  second  stage)  magnitudes  which 
reproduce  the  concrete  object  in  the  picture,  and 
finally  returns  (in  the  Kinetic  Arts)  to  the  con- 
crete fullness  of  nature  in  the  living  Bod}^  which, 
however,  now  moves  in  Time  and  brings  forth 
the  artistic  product.  The  common  element  in 
these  Arts  is  the  immediate  material  form,  as 
solid,  as  pictured,  and  as  moving  from  within, 
which  form  is  ultimately  taken  for  the  purpose 
of  reproducing  the  divinely  creative  Self  to 
human  vision. 

Under  the  present  head,  then,  we  shall  first 
consider  the  Plastic  Arts  as  represented  by 
Sculpture,  the  general  character  of  which  will  be 
next  indicated. 

1.  Sculpture.  This  is  the  first  of  the  Pre- 
sentative  Arts,  reproducing  wholly  or  partially 
the  material  body  in  all  its  spatial  fullness,  hav- 
ing the  three  dimensions,  length,  breadth,  and 
thickness.  Chiefly,  however,  the  Human  Organ- 
ism is  taken  b}"  the  creative  Ego  of  the  sculptor, 
and  employed  in  its  objective  completeness  in 
order  to  represent  the  God  and  the  Godlike. 
Such  is  the  Conception  of  the  artist,  which  is  his 
genetic  principle;   he    nuist   behold  the    genetic 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  557 

principle  of  the  world  and  reproduce  that  by  his 
creative  fiat  in  his  material  —  stone,  metal, 
clay,  wood.  Still  the  work  must  bear  the  special 
mark  of  his  Ego,  the  impress  of  hisindividualit}', 
which  is  also  creative  just  in  this  act  of  re-creating 
in  image  the  divinely  creative  Ego,  this  indeed 
being  the  primordial  act  of  Conception.  By  this 
Conception  each  particular  detail  is  vivified  as  it 
goes  over  into  reality,  taking  on  artistic  form, 
every  part  of  which  is  to  suggest  the  generating 
Idea. 

Most  famous  among  the  statues  of  Greece  was 
that  of  Zeus,  the  supreme  Hellenic  God,  set  up 
in  his  temple  at  Olympia.  It  was  the  work  of 
Phidias,  who  is  said  to  have  received  the  approval 
of  Zeus  himself  by  a  flash  of  lightning,  when  the 
statue  was  dedicated.  Plotinus,  the  philosopher, 
declared  that  the  artist  in  spirit  beheld  how  the 
God  would  be  fashioned,  if  he  should  reveal 
himself  to  us  face  to  face.  But  what  is  it  that 
is  thus  revealed  through  a  statue,  an  object  of 
sense?  It  is  matter,  but  not  literally  so;  it  is 
matter  re-formed,  re-created  as  it  were,  endowed 
with  a  spirit.  Zeus  was  the  ruling  deity,  the 
God  of  the  State,  in  whom  reposed  the  world's 
authorit}^  he  manifested  the  universal  Will 
Avhich  was  to  subordinate  the  capricious  individ- 
ual Greek  Will.  He  was,  accordingly,  the  cre- 
ative and  sustaining  power  behind  all  Institutions 
of  the  Hellenic  race,  secular  and  religious;  the 


558  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

old  Greek  beheld  him  in  the  statue,  worshiped 
him,  communed  with  him,  and  drew  from  such 
communion  the  very  blood  of  his  institutional  life. 
The  Zeus  of  Phidias  Avas  not  the  copy  of  some 
man,  though  the  shape  was  human ;  the  statue 
was  not  a  portrait  after  some  model,  though  the 
finite  form  was  present  and  visible.  What  was 
it,  then,  that  looked  out  of  that  plastic  figure? 
Something  which  made  it  truly  a  work  of  art, 
and  the  greatest  of  its  kind.  Such  is  the  inborn 
bent,  the  genius  of  the  artist;  he  sei2ses  his  mate- 
rial and  creates  therein  the  visage  of  the  divinely 
creative  power,  which  act  is  his  own  genetic 
Conception.  He  must  possess  skillful  technique, 
yet  also  a  gift  far  higher;  skillful  technique  will 
produce  only  the  accurate  likeness  of  some 
individual. 

The  physical  material  is,  therefore,  given  to 
the  sculptor,  who  is  to  work  in  it  as  his  own 
native  element  and  to  transform  it  into  a  new 
kind  of  existence.  Also  the  bodily  orgajiism  is 
given  to  him  by  external  Nature,  which,  on  the 
one  hand,  he  is  to  imitate  in  its  particular  feature, 
yet  on  the  other  hand,  he  is  to  fill  with  a  univer- 
sal meaning.  Still  further,  he  receives  a  most 
important  gift  from  his  people,  from  his  age,  or 
perchance  from  his  race;  it  is  his  theme,  the 
content  of  his  Avork,  which  is  or  was  once  trans- 
mitted to  him  mainly  in  a  mythical  form.  The 
true  Mythus  is  the  product,  not  of  the  individual, 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  559 

but  of  the  national,  possibly  of  the  racial,  con- 
sciousness. The  artist  receives  it  and  moulds  it 
afresh;  he  has,  or  did  have  in  old  Greece,  a 
mythical  material  as  well  as  a  physical ;  the  story 
of  the  Gods  he  is  to  transmute  into  stone,  and 
thus  reveal  them  to  the  people  in  some  divine 
act.  Still  the  artist  must  be  free  to  work  out 
his  Conception  even  in  this  legendary  material 
coming  down  from  antiquity ;  his  creative  Ego 
also  must  manifest  itself  in  creating  worthily  the 
shapes  of  the  Gods.  Indeed  his  genius  appears 
just  at  the  point  where  it  touches  the  deity,  who 
is  likewise  a  creative  Ego.  If  the  traditional 
overbears  the  artist's  freedom  of  Conception, 
just  the  original  element  will  drop  out  of  the 
artistic  product,  which  will  then  become  fixed, 
conventional,  unfree,  clogged  in  its  own  material. 
Such  was  the  case  in  ancient  Egypt. 

The  statue  of  the  God  is  not  a  portrait, 
though  it  be  strongly  individualized ;  but  the 
very  strength  of  individuality  is  manifested  by 
the  fact  that  the  individual  is  now  the  bearer  of 
the  Divine.  Far  greater  than  any  mortal  is  such 
a  work ;  the  true  individual  of  sculpture  is  uni- 
versal, a  divinity.  The  veritable  image  of  the 
God  seeks  not  the  favor,  not  the  look  of  the 
spectator;  toward  the  infinite  and  eternal  is 
directed  the  glance,  hence  its  serenity,  its 
impassiveness,  yea,  its  indefiniteness ;  it  has  an 
outer,  but  no  inner  eve,  with  color,  keenness, 


560  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

individuality.  The  statue  is  often  said  to  leave 
us  cold ;  it  lacks  sympathy,  nay,  humanity;  it  is 
just  a  little  too  divine  for  us,  who  want  the 
divine-human  in  the  God.  Undoubtedly  such 
statements  touch  the  limitations  of  sculpture  as 
an  Art,  and  hint  the  need  of  another  and  deeper 
Art  which  is  soon  to  follow. 

Still  sculpture  has  its  place  in  history  and 
gives  its  discipline  to  the  race.  In  lofty  serenity 
the  God  of  sculpture  disdains  to  assume  an  in- 
OTatiatino;,  flatterino^,  or  even  condescendinoj  look 
to  the  beholder,  manifestly  he  seeks  not  the 
spectator's  pleasure  or  entertainment. 

Mortal  man,  gazing  on  the  statue  with  adora- 
tion, has  to  elevate  himself  out  of  his  petty  finite 
individuality  and  to  commune  with  the  universal 
divinely  creative  Ego,  of  which  the  work  of  Art 
is  the  revelation. 

The  Greek  world  was  the  sculpturesque  world. 
The  Hellenic  view  of  the  Universe  was  plastic ; 
otherwise  it  would  not  have  embodied  the  Gods, 
the  creative  principle  of  all  things,  in  the  marble 
shapes  of  sculpture.  Even  the  great  individuals 
of  Greek  poetry  and  of  Greek  life  have  this 
plastic  character;  we  think  of  Prometheus  as 
a  gigantic  statue  endowed  with  speech  and 
motion,  and  the  maker  of  him,  the  poet  JHschy- 
lus,  leaves  on  the  mind  of  the  reader  the 
same  lofty  statuesque  impression.  Pericles 
the  statesman,  Thueydides  the  historian,  Plato 


THE  EDVCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  561 

the  philosopher,  show  a  similar  character,  and, 
above  all,  Phidias,  the  maker  of  the  forms 
of  the  Gods,  is  like  one  of  his  own  plastic  shapes 
in  his  divinely  creative  act.  Marathon  was  a 
sculpturesque  battle  producing  the  Parthenon 
and  its  indwellinoj  divine  Athena  as  well  as  hun- 
dreds  of  other  statues ;  the  whole  Persian  War  was 
a  kind  of  Gigantomachia,  sculptured  in  divinely 
colossal  deeds,  a  war  of  the  Greek  Gods  against 
enormous  hosts  of  Barbary.  So  the  Athenians 
must  have  conceived  it,  for  they  revealed  this 
conception  in  their  temples,  statues,  monuments, 
and  works  of  Art  after  the  great  event. 

The  Greek  individual,  therefore,  in  his  most 
intense  individuality,  had  to  manifest  the  univer- 
sal principle  of  himself ;  he  became  truly  a  man 
by  embodying  and  supporting  his  institutional 
world.  The  famous  story  in  Herodotus  (Book 
I.  29)  concerning  the  interview  between  Solon 
and  Croesus  brings  out  strongly  the  Greek,  and 
specially  the  Athenian  world-view.  "Who  is  the 
happy  man  among  mortals?  '*  asks  Croesus. 
"  Tellus  the  Athenian,"  answers  Solon.  Why? 
"  Because  his  country  was  prosperous  in  his  days, 
and  he  himself  had  sons  both  beautiful  and 
good;  "  thus  he  lived  harmoniously  the  life  of 
his  State  and  his  Family.  Then  in  a  battle  near 
Eleusis,  "  he  came  to  the  assistance  of  his  coun- 
trymen, routed  the  foe,  and  died  upon  the  field 
most  gloriously."  Such  a  man,  filled  with  the 
36 


562  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

institutional  spirit  of  his  people,  is  the  ideal  indi- 
vidual ;  hence  we  read  that  *'  the  Athenians  gave 
him  a  public  funeral  and  paid  him  the  highest 
honors."  Alono-side  of  this  secular  institutional 
life  at  Athens  we  read  in  the  same  passage  the 
story  of  the  two  Argive  youths,  who  manifest 
their  devotion  to  the  religious  institutional  life  of 
their  country,  and  to  their  mother  who  was 
priestess  in  the  temple  of  Juno. 

The  Greek  had  not  fully  actualized  the  insti- 
tutional Will,  making  it  a  complete  objective  fact 
in  the  World.  Thus  it  comes  that  the  individual 
as  parent,  as  citizen,  as  religionist,  as  Greek  and 
civilized  man  versus  Barbarian  and  uncivilized 
man,  had  to  embody  in  himself  the  institu- 
tions of  his  people,  and  make  himself  personally 
their  representative  and  upholder.  This  gives 
to  the  old  Greek  that  plastic  character  of  which 
we  have  just  spoken.  The  universal,  divinely 
active  principle  of  his  race  was  incarnated  in  him, 
in  his  very  body,  and  made  him  a  living  statue, 
which  the  artist  had  merely  to  turn  to  stone. 

Very  different  is  the  situation  now.  The  mod- 
ern world  has  actualized  institutions  far  in  ad- 
vance of  the  old  Greek  world,  but  does  not  pro- 
duce the  ancient  plastic  character.  The  great 
men  of  Hellas,  particularly  for  our  secular  insti- 
tutional life,  are  still  our  exemplars;  we  cite  them 
aa  types  after  which  we  unconsciously  pattern 
ourselves. 


TEE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  .')68 

We  shall  pass  next  to  the  Graphic  Arts,  which 
reproduce  the  solid  material  world  not  in  solid 
forms,  but  through  the  surface,  line  and  point, 
which  make  the  picture.  Only  about  Painting 
can  a  few  remarks  be  made  in  this  place. 

2.  Painting.  There  is  alwaj's  felt  to  be  a 
very  intimate  relation  between  Sculpture  and 
Painting.  One  is  taken  to  explain  the  other ;  to 
a  certain  extent  they  have  developed  alongside 
of  each  other,  and  to  a  certain  extent  one, 
Sculpture,  has  developed  into  the  other,  Paint- 
ing. With  the  famous  Greek  sculptors  co-existed 
Greek  painters  equally  famous  apparently ;  the 
two  often  wrought  together  in  producing  a  great 
work  of  Art,  such  as  the  Propylaea,  for  instance, 
in  which  the  Architect  also  took  part.  Yet  there 
can  be  hardly  a  doubt  that  Greek  Painting  leaned 
toward  the  sculpturesque  in  the  bloom  of  Hel- 
lenic Art,  while  Greek  sculpture  had  a  tendency 
to  develop  more  and  more  into  the  picturesque. 
Deeply  intergrown  are  the  two  Arts  in  their  un- 
folding through  Time ;  they  have  been  designated 
not  only  as  sisters,  but  as  male  and  female,  nay, 
as  husband  and  wife.  Sculpture  being  called  mas- 
culine, and  Painting  feminine. 

In  spite  of  this  unity  and  interfusion,  however, 
the  two  Arts  are  seen  to  be  very  distinct,  often 
in  striking  contrast  with  each  other.  Indeed, 
among  the  Somatic  Arts,  Painting  shows  the  inner 
scission  of  the  Ego,  it  represents  the  separative 


5  64  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

stage,  while  Sculpture  in  comparison  has  the 
element  of  oneness  with  itself,  of  an  immediate 
unity  between  the  individual  and  the  universal 
principle  of  the  Ego.  The  one  shows  the  sorrow 
of  the  soul  in  its  transition  to  peace,  the  other 
has  hardly  any  internal  disruption,  but  manifests 
in  its  best  period  an  unquestioning  harmony  be- 
tween the  sensuous  and  the  spiritual,  that  Olym- 
pian serenity  which  is  the  characteristic  of  the 
Gods. 

Sculpture  and  Painting,  in  fact,  taken  in  their 
highest  bloom  and  perfection,  represent  two  dif- 
ferent worlds ;  the  sweep  from  summit  to  sum- 
mit of  each  Art  is  the  sweep  from  Heathendom 
into  Christendom.  The  Greek  God  descends 
into  the  finite,  into  the  human  body,  becomes  an 
individual,  is  happy  and  truly  at  home  in  his 
narrow  abode ;  thus  Sculpture  represents  him  as 
serene,  though  in  its  later  epoch  the  scission  be- 
gins to  enter.  The  Divine  in  Christian  Art  is 
also  represented  as  descending  into  flesh,  which 
is  for  a  time  to  be  endured,  then  transcended  and 
crucified,  whereby  spirit  returns  to  itseK  out  of 
finitude  with  untold  suffering,  and  at  last  finds 
reconciliation.  Such  is,  in  general,  the  transition 
from  Sculpture  to  Painting,  as  it  has  impressed 
itself  on  the  ages.  All  Art  has  in  some  way  to 
give  the  idea  of  God ;  the  Christian  divinity,  as 
portrayed  by  Painting,  is  seen  enduring  the 
crucifixion    of  the  body,  and  thereby  asseiting 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  565 

the  mastery  and  the  independence  of  the  spirit. 
This  process  is  one  of  pain  and  of  triumph, 
wherein  the  outer  shape  is  shown  as  sacrificed ; 
this  sacrifice  of  the  individual  tlirough  itself  is 
just  the  gaining  of  itself,  its  restoration  after  the 
scission  and  the  sorrow.  Painting  is  supremely 
the  Christian  Art,  though  all  the  world,  ancient 
and  modern.  Orient  and  Occident,  has  painted 
and  still  paints. 

The  first  fact  of  Painting  is  that  the  sensuous 
completeness  of  the  body,  with  its  three  dimen- 
sions, is  reduced  to  a  mere  surface.  That  is,  the 
outer  shape  in  its  material  fullness  is  sacrificed, 
it  is  made  over  into  an  appearance,  a  show  of  the 
body,  whose  purpose  is  to  manifest  the  soul 
within ;  the  external  organism  is  thus  trans- 
formed into  a  ghost,  a  spirit.  Through  color 
this  show  becomes  a  marvelous  revelation  of  the 
inner  movements  and  changes  of  the  soul.  Thus 
Painting  puts  its  stress  upon  the  internal  emo- 
tional play  and  interplay  within  us. 

Deep  and  intense  is  the  separation  in  the  Ego, 
which  it  is  the  prime  function  of  Painting  to 
portray.  In  fact,  there  is  a  triple  separation, 
and  all  three  forms  are  to  be  set  forth  in  this 
sphere.  There  is,  in  the  first  place,  the  disrup- 
tion of  the  immediate  unity  of  the  individual 
with  the  universal  Ego  —  which  unity  we  beheld 
in  Sculpture.  Inthe  second  place,  the  universal, 
divine  Ego,  having  assumed  the  body,  is  separated 


566  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

from  it  through  crucifixion  and  death.  In  the 
third  place  the  individual  Ego  shows,  and  indeed 
must  sho^Y  the  same  scission ;  man  falls  out  with 
his  body,  will  crucify  that  too  with  its  appetites 
and  passions.  In  all  these  cases  there  is  suffering, 
physical  and  mental,  but  there  is  also  the  tri- 
umph and  the  reconciliation  which  it  is  the  aim  of 
Christian  Art  to  bring  to  visibility  and  conscious- 
ness. 

It  may  be  said,  therefore,  that  Christ  had  to 
die  before  Painting  could  attain  its  highest  ex- 
cellence. The  spirit  had  to  pass  through  its 
deepest  negative  act  in  the  Passion  of  the  Lord 
and  all  the  pain  thereof,  ere  the  human  shape 
could  reveal  in  color  the  depths  of  the  internality 
of  the  soul.  The  religious  Will,  with  its  self-re- 
nunciation, with  its  "  broken  and  contrite  heart " 
is  the  source  and  the  content  of  Painting  at  its 
best,  which  reduces  the  human  organism  to  a  va- 
riegated outer  play  of  the  inner  movements  of  the 
Ego,  so  that  Art  becomes  subtle  and  suofgestive 
in  this  sphere  beyond  any  other  kind  of  expres- 
sion. All  the  elusive  iridescence  of  the  spirit 
naturally  goes  over  into  color  as  its  nearest  phy- 
sical counterpart.  The  pure  sunlight  of  the 
Divine  Ego,  passing  through  these  manifold 
human  shapes  with  all  their  manifold  emotions, 
is  transmuted  into  a  sympathetic  glow  of  rainbow 
tints,  which  of  themselves  reflect  their  origin. 
Am  farbigen  Abglanz  liahen  iinr  dan  Leben^  says 


THE  EDUCATIVE  mSTITUTION.  567 

Faust  as  he  rises  up  from  his  great  sorrow, 
and  beholds  the  Sun  shining  through  the  spray 
of  the  cataract  and  throwing  perpetualW  shifting 
arches  of  many-colored  radiance  over  the  abyss. 
Thus  the  rainbow  of  nature  not  only  suggests 
but  is  generated  by  the  one  central  luminary,  and 
its  tints  become  of  themselves  a  manifestation 
and  a  symbol  of  the  Divine  Light. 

Thus  color  is  by  its  very  nature  the  most  sym- 
pathetic, most  responsive  material  of  Painting, 
and  is  moreover  the  separation  and  particulariza- 
tion  of  the  one  white  visible  sheen  of  Sculpture, 
which  has  the  single  blank  color,  as  it  were,  in 
contrast  to  the  multiplicity  of  painted  colors. 
Sculpture,  if  not  exactly  eyeless,  is  at  least  quite 
lookless,  without  the  sparkle  of  the  ocular  hue  in 
its  glance,  which  always  reveals  the  Self  within. 
The  God  of  Sculpture  is  the  Divine  Ego  as  purely 
substantial,  reposing  upon  its  own  eternal  Self, 
without  the  turn  to  the  mortal,  finite  individual. 
The  God  of  Sculpture  is  not  directed  toward  the 
spectator,  is  not  directly  for  the  recipient  Ego, 
but  the  recipient  Ego  is  rather  for  it  and  is  to 
become  through  contemplation  of  it  the  bearer 
of  the  institutional  world,  of  which  it  is  the  im- 
manent creative  principle.  When  Sculpture 
begins  to  turn  to  the  spectator,  and  to  be  pleas- 
ing and  graceful  for  his  sake,  it  has  passed  its 
culmination  and  is  declining  from  its  divine  mis- 
sion which  is  to  reveal  the  Gods  in  their  plastic 


568  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

character.  There  is  no  recognition  of  the  Ego 
on  the  part  of  the  Gods  of  Greek  Sculpture, 
their  look  is  turned  elsewhither;  or,  when  there 
begins  to  be  such  recognition  in  them,  they  are 
calling  for  a  new  art,  for  Painting,  whose  func- 
tion is  to  recognize  and  to  express  the  individual 
finite  Ego  in  all  its  subjective  transformations, 
through  which,  however,  is  to  be  reflected  the 
divinely  creative  Spirit. 

As  spatial  bodies  are  reduced  to  a  surface  in 
Painting,  so  is  Space  itself  brought  to  a  plane  in 
like  manner;  that  is,  a  limited  portion  of  Space 
with  its  width,  depth,  and  height  is  made  to 
appear  in  a  picture,  which  is  said  to  h«ve  its 
foreground  and  its  background,  and  even  its 
middle  ground.  This  is  the  function  of  linear 
perspective,  which  has  a  very  significant  place  in 
the  transition  from  Sculpture  to  Painting.  Then 
comes  in  the  same  connection  what  is  called 
aerial  perspective,  which  pertains  to  the  variations 
of  coloring,  as  determined  by  distance,  and 
as  seen  through  the  atmosphere.  Landscape 
specially  calls  into  play  the  element  of  perspective 
in  both  its  forms. 

Sculpture  on  the  other  hand,  both  in  its 
single  figures  and  in  its  groups  has  the  tendency 
to  employ  immediate  Space,  not  the  appearance 
thereof  on  a  surface.  It  is  so  to  speak  fated, 
fated  by  nature,  by  externality.  Hence  the 
Greek  Gods  have  an  element  of  Fate  even  in  their 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  569 

serenity ;  there  is  an  outer  necessity  hanging  over 
them,  which  from  the  first  is  faintly  suggested  in 
their  look.  Implicit  at  the  beginning,  the  f  eehng 
of  Fate  gradually  becomes  explicit  in  the  statue, 
till  in  the  Niobe  group  and  in  the  Laocoon,  it 
becomes  the  all-absorbing  fact,  and  represents  the 
human  beino-  or  even  the  God  as  tragic  —  trao;ic 
through  Fate.  Thus  the  Greek  world  and  its 
beautiful  Gods  sink  down  under  the  stroke  of 
destiny,  and  with  them  Sculpture,  as  the  Art  of 
Hellas,  passes  away,  having  portrayed  its  own 
death  blow.  Sculpturesque  serenity  goes  over 
into  pain  and  stoical  endurance,  but  Painting- 
will  show  the  spiritual  restoration  and  the  blessed- 
ness attained  through  the  fiery  ordeal,  it  will 
give  the  conquest  of  Fate  and  the  movement 
into  Freedom. 

But  Painting  has  its  external  limits  in  Space 
and  Time,  being  compressed,  as  it  were,  to  a 
spatial  and  temporal  point,  and  held  fast  therein 
forever.  Next,  we  are  to  take  note  of  an  Art 
which  breaks  these  external  chains,  but  in  the 
same  act  conies  upon  new  limits  peculiar  to  itself. 

3.  In  the  Kinetic  Arts  we  pass  to  the  move- 
ment of  the  Body,  which  is  taken  to  express 
what  it  can  of  the  divine  movement.  And  here 
it  may  be  noted  that  the  dance  among  many  peo- 
ples has  been  a  form  of  worship.  Bodily  motion, 
as  well  as  song,  picture,  statue,  has  been  em- 
ployed to  express  religion. 


570  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

In  Sculpture  and  Painting,  the  body  is  fixed  in 
Space  and  Time;  the  statue  stands  still  in  its 
place,  and  the  picture  holds  fast  one  moment  of 
an  action.  But  now  the  visible  form  passes  into 
moving  statues  or  animated  pictures,  passes 
from  its  reproduced  fixity  into  the  living  activity 
of  the  present,  and,  therefore,  can  express  th& 
continuous  movement  of  a  process. 

Moreover  the  material  form  returns  from  the 
abstract  magnitudes  of  Painting  to  the  full 
dimensions  of  Sculpture;  surface,  line,  and  point 
go  back  to  length,  breadth  and  thickness;  the 
solid  Body  is  again  employed,  though  moving  it- 
self from  within  and  giving  a  succession  of 
shapes  combined  into  a  series  of  transforma- 
tions. 

There  are  many  phases  of  the  Kinetic  Arts, 
especially  are  they  subsidiary  to  other  Arts.  We 
may  mention  first  the  dramatic  actor,  who  is  to 
employ  living  movement  on  the  stage.  Anciently 
he  leaned  to  the  sculpturesque  both  in  form  and 
drapery ;  in  the  plays  of  ^schylus  and  Sophocles 
the  characters  have  a  plastic  simplicity  and  move 
in  a  plastic  world.  In  good  modern  representa- 
tions of  the  classic  drama  we  see  the  same  sculp- 
turesque forms  reproduced  in  their  antique  move- 
ment and  environment,  for  instance  in  Goethe's 
Iphigenia.  Still,  modern  acting  on  the  whole  has 
more  the  tendency  to  the  picturesque,  is  closer  to 
Painting  than  to  Sculpture. 


TEE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  671 

The  language  of  facial  expression  and  of  ges- 
ture may  be  elevated  into  an  Art  by  the  orator, 
an  Art,  however,  which  is  still  subsidiary.  In 
Naples  and  in  Southern  countries  generally,  the 
Kinetic  Arts  in  the  form  of  miniicrv,  gesticula- 
tion, and  grimace,  are  an  important  part  of  popular 
expression.  Delsarte  and  others  have  sought  to 
organize  and  correlate  bodilv  motions  into  an  Art 
or  perchance  a  Science. 

But  the  most  important  and  significant  of  the 
Kinetic  Arts  is  the  dance,  which,  though  often  sub- 
sidiary, may  become  an  independent  Art,  and  be 
made  to  represent  spirit,  even  the  divinely  creative 
Self.  The  sacred  dances  of  peoples  are  in  honor 
of  their  Gods,  whose  doings  are  therein  repre- 
sented and  celebrated.  From  this  high  purpose 
the  dance  with  advancing  civilization  seems  to 
sink  down  to  a  mere  amusement,  or  to  an  adjunct 
of  some  sort.  Still  amusement  can  be  made 
artistic;  even  the  popular  festival,  usually  a 
chaotic  mass  of  moving  individuals,  can  be  trans- 
formed into  a  work  of  Art,  as  well  as  into  a 
means  of  education.  As  far  as  our  knowledge 
goes,  the  most  successful  and  suggestive  attempt 
of  this  kind  was  made  by  Frederick  Froebel, 
founder  of  the  kindergarten,  who  took  a  harum- 
scarum  German  Volksfesf,  and  transformed  it  into 
a  marvelous  means  of  popular  education  without 
taking  away  the  free  festal  joyousness  which 
belongs  to  such   an  occasion.     Thus  the  festival 


^72  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

becomes  a  part  of  the  great  Educative  Institu- 
tion. (See  Froebel's  own  account  of  the  Alten- 
stein  Festival  in  his  works,  ed.  Lange.) 

So  much  for  the  Somatic  Arts  in  their  three 
divisions,  all  of  which  have  in  common  the  Body 
of  Nature,  supremely  the  Human  Body,  as  the 
bearer  of  the  artistic  content.  But  now  an  ex- 
plicit, visible  separation  takes  place  into  the 
inner  and  outer,  two  Bodies  or  material  forms 
expressive  of  the  divinely  creative  Ego  appear  or 
may  appear,  of  which  the  second  calls  forth  the 
following  Art. 

II.  Architecture.  In  this  Art  there  is  felt 
to  be  a  profound  dualism  or  twofoldness ;  it  is 
an  outside  covering  or  dwelling-place  of  the  spirit 
or  the  form  which  is  inside;  it  both  excludes 
and  includes  ;  it  is  determined  by  something  with- 
in (spirit,  the  Divine),  yet  also  by  something 
without  (the  earth,  gravity  in  the  superposition 
of  heavy  masses ) .  In  the  temples  of  the  Gods 
made  by  the  Greeks,  whose  Architecture  still 
largely  rules  the  world,  this  twofoldness  was 
directly  present  to  vision :  there  was  the  statue 
or  idol  inside,  encompassed  by  the  edifice  outside 
which  was  the  sacred  House  of  the  Deity.  Two 
material  forms  we  thus  behold,  both  of  them 
manifesting  the  God,  3'et  in  quite  opposite  ways. 

In  the  Somatic  Arts  the  material  form  was  the 
immediate  artistic  expression,  but  in  Architec- 
ture the  material  form  is  a  mediated  one,  being 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION,  578 

determined  by  the  spirit  within  as  its  completely 
external  separated  covering  or  abode,  its  inor- 
ganic Body.  Architecture  has  both  an  outer 
and  an  inner  determination,  between  which  it 
fluctuates,  especially  in  its  historic  evolution.  It 
is  the  supported  and  the  supporter  both  in  one, 
the  burden  and  the  burden-bearer ;  it  rises  usually 
in  layers  like  the  strata  of  the  Earth,  yet  is 
alwa^'s  ordered  from  within ;  it  is  the  stratifica- 
tion not  of  Nature  but  of  Spirit.  Great  Archi- 
tecture reveals  God  as  builder,  as  creator  of  the 
universe.  The  grand  religious  edifice  is  con- 
structed by  man  as  architect,  yet  he  reveals  in 
his  structure  the  Divine  Architect,  the  builder  of 
the  cosmos.  The  genius  as  artist  will  show  in 
his  Art  the  divinely  creative  Ego,  who  must  here 
be  suggested  as  the  supreme  artificer.  The 
Maker  of  the  world  has  his  own  separate  peculiar 
Home  in  the  world,  distinct  from  the  vast  Body 
of  Nature,  an  external  counterpart  of  Himself, 
yet  reflecting  Himself. 

Architecture  also  produces  the  Home  of  man 
and  thus  is  sprung  of  the  Family,  the  genetic 
Institution.  The  Home  of  the  universal  Family 
with  its  supreme  creative  principle  finds  expres- 
sion in  the  religious  edifice,  and  is  the  primal 
source  of  Great  Architecture.  Not  the  Religious 
Institution  alone,  but  also  the  Secular  Institution 
has  expressed  itself  in  great  structures,  such  as 
Capitols,   City-Halls,    Court-Houses.     Still  fur- 


574  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ther,  the  Educative  Institution  is  developing  its 
own  Architecture,  usually  copied,  but  with  many 
original  turns  which  can  be  observed  in  recent 
School  Buildings  of  various  kinds. 

Here  we  can  only  allude  to  the  Evolution  of 
Architecture,  which  has  shown  itself  in  three 
grand  sweeps  which  may  be  named  Oriental, 
European,  and  Occidental.  The  latter  is  at 
present  evolving  itself  most  strongly  and  origi- 
nally in  America,  whose  so-called  High  Building- 
is  making  an  epoch  in  the  arcchitectural  move- 
ment of  the  world.  This  last  epoch  has  only 
just  begun,  but  it  has  already  wrought  the  most 
decisive  change  in  the  structural  as  well  as 
aesthetic  canons  of  this  Art. 

HI.  Music.  This  we  place  the  third  of  the 
Presentative  Arts,  in  which  the  artistic  object  is 
presented  to  the  Senses,  and  through  these  is 
taken  up  and  appropriated  by  the  Ego.  In 
Music  the  Sense  of  Hearing  is  the  channel  be- 
tween the  outer  and  inner  worlds,  and  we  pass 
from  the  fixed  forms  of  Space  to  the  moving 
forms  of  Time,  for  such  we  may  call  the  meas- 
ured and  carefully  adjusted  tones  which  are  the 
primary  material  of  Music. 

Moreover,  if  we  note  this  element  of  Time  in 
Music,  we  observe  that  it  always  comes  back  to 
itself  in  every  bar,  so  that  the  succession  of  these 
bars  is  a  series  of  small  vortices  or  sound-whorls 
which  spin  round  and  round  in  going  forward  like 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  57o 

a  pair  of  waltzers.  Time,  continuously  turning- 
back  into  itself  through  sound  is  the  outer  ele- 
mental principle  in  Music. 

Still  further  it  should  be  remarked  that  this 
line  of  musical  whorls  called  bars  comes  back  to 
its  starting-point  and  concludes  itself  with  its 
fundamental,  usually  called  the  key-note.  Here 
we  can  see  that  the  little  cycles  of  time  (bars) 
move  in  a  large  cycle  of  sound,  which  large  cycle 
(usually  called  a  strain)  is  but  a  part  of  a  still 
larger  cycle  in  extensive  musical  compositions 
such  as  the  sonata  and  symphony.  So  we  can 
say  that  the  essential  characteristic  of  Music  is 
this  self -returning  sound. 

It  is  a  curious  fact  the  single  tone  produces 
what  are  called  overtones  in  a  series  of  octaves 
with  intervening  chords  and  notes.  The  octave 
is  a  self-return  of  the  tone  after  passing  through 
and  containing  ideally  the  different  notes  of  the 
scale  lying  between.  Thus  the  single  tone  after 
going  forth  in  separation  from  itself,  comes  back 
to  itself  of  its  own  inherent  nature.  It  was 
Helmholtz  who  first  elaborated  fully  the  subject 
of  overtones,  and  showed  them  to  be  the  origin 
of  the  scale  as  well  as  the  genetic  source  of  har- 
mony. 

The  recurrence  of  tone,  its  unceasing  going 
forth  out  of  itself  and  cominsj  back  to  itself  is 
the  creative  fact  of  Music.  Biologically  speak- 
ing we  may  say  that  the  embryonic  cell  out  of 


576  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

which  all  Music  proceeds  is  a  sound  or  series  of 
sounds  which  is  made  to  return  into  itself. 

Now  comes  the  fundamental  psychical  fact  of 
Music :  this  self-returning  sound,  stimulating 
the  Ego  throuo;h  the  Sense  of  Hearinsf,  rouses  it 
to  its  primordial  self-activity,  to  the  first  actus 
purus  of  the  Ego,  which  is  the  primal  Psychosis 
in  its  pure  energy.  Music  stirs  the  original  Self 
of  man,  hence  come  its  power  and  its  delight, 
since  it  renews  in  the  Ego  the  hitter's  first  crea- 
tive act  of  selfhood,  the  soul's  first  process  which 
is  also  a  self -separation  and  a  self -return,  now 
set  a-going  and  upborne  in  a  continual  round- 
dance  of  circling  sounds. 

Such  is,  in  general,  the  inner  character  of 
Music,  but  now  we  are  to  see  more  distinctly 
why  it  is  the  third  stage  in  the  total  process  of 
the  Sense-Arts  (Presentative).  Sight,  in  taking 
up  the  outer  material  object  projects  it  as  a  fixed 
Body  into  the  external  world.  But  Hearing  in- 
ternalizes the  sound  waves  coming  from  the  fixed 
Body  which  has  been  assailed  and  so  made  to 
vibrate.  In  Music  the  solid  cosmos  is  dissolving 
into  sound  and  going  back  to  its  creative  source 
in  the  Self.  In  the  Somatic  Arts  the  Ego  pro- 
jects itself  into  the  material  form,  for  example, 
into  the  statue;  but  in  Music  the  statue  be- 
comes fluid,  as  it  were,  and  is  borne  back  to  the 
Ego,  its  starting-point.  From  the  Self  and  back 
to  it  is  the  cycle  of  the  Fine  Arts.     Music  is  a 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  577 

perpetual  flowing  inwards  from  the  outer,  while 
Sculpture,  for  instance,  is  a  fixing  of  the  inner  in 
the  solid  outer  shape.  Architecture  is  a  throw- 
ing outward  of  a  second  artistic  Body  in  separa- 
tion from  the  first  and  from  the  immediate  Self; 
but  Music  is  the  opposite  movement,  a  carrjdng 
back  of  architectonic  sound-masses  and  building 
them  into  an  inner  temple  of  the  soul. 

Primarily  Music  rouses  the  simple  elemental 
Ego  of  the  hearer  to  its  original  self-creative 
process,  and  thus  makes  it  feel  at  one  with  the 
divinely  creative  Ego,  creator  of  all  and  of  itself 
too.  Hence  the  deeply  religious  character  of 
Music  in  its  unperverted  primal  manifestations, 
it  unites  the  recipient  Ego  with  God  in  their 
fundamental  common  act  of  Selfhood,  in  their 
first  unconscious  identity  of  spirit. 

But  the  musical  tone  is  to  have  not  simply 
itself  as  its  content,  but  is  to  be  filled  with  the 
image  w^hereby  it  becomes  the  word  wrapped  in  a 
dancing  periphery  of  sound-waves.  This  brings 
us  to  a  new  group  of  arts. 

II.  Representative  Arts. 

The  primal  fact  of  Representation  is  the 
Imag^e  as  that  of  Presentation  is  the  Per- 
cept.  This  distinction  is  a  fundamental  one 
in  Art,  springing  directly  from  the  psychical 
process    of    the   Ego   in    its    separative    stage. 

37     . 


578  SOCIAL  JXSTITUTlOyS. 

The  Image  is  primaril}'  derived  from  the  Per- 
cept, being  separated  from  it  and  thereby 
made  explicit.  The  Image  belongs  to  the  inner 
world  of  the  Ego,  though  originally  taken  from 
the  outer  world  of  material  forms  which  are 
represented,  or  presented  a  second  time  as  objects 
in  the  present  sphere. 

It  is  manifest  that  the  Ego  has  a  control  over 
the  Image  far  more  complete  than  it  has  over  the 
Percept.  It  will  accordingly  proceed  to  put  into 
the  Image  a  meaning  or  content  derived  from 
itself,  whereby  the  Image  becomes  Symbol,  which 
brings  us  distinctly  into  the  realm  of  Art.  The 
artistic  Symbol  is  thus  twofold,  having  in  it  a 
side  of  Nature  and  a  side  of  Spirit  or  Thought. 
When  I  employ  the  image  of  a  lion  not  merely  to 
represent  the  natural  object  of  that  name,  but 
also  to  represent  sovereignty  or  strength,  I  am 
using  a  Symbol  in  one  of  its  simplest  forms. 

Finally,  the  Ego  seizes  upon  the  sound  of  the 
voice,  and  fills  the  same  with  its  own  meaning 
and  purpose.  This  is  the  most  plastic  material 
for  expression  known  in  Nature.  The  spoken 
Word  unfolds  to  view,  which,  being  developed 
and  organized,  becomes  language.  Now  the 
Symbol  is  a  Sign  exchangeable  between  man  and 
man  —  not  merely  an  outer  Sign,  but  an  inner 
one,  the  Image  itself,  which  is  transferred  from 
brain  to  brain  through  the  Word  spoken,  writ- 
ten, printed.     Thus  we  behold  an  intercommuni- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  IXSTITUTION.  579 

cation  of  Images  between  human  souls,  which  is 
the  basic  fact  of  the  Eepresentative  Arts. 

Very  marvelous  is  the  Word,  beins;  the  condi- 
tion  of  all  social  life  among  men.  I  at  this  point 
load  the  sound  of  my  voice  with  my  meaning  and 
send  it  forth;  it  sweeps  through  the  intervening 
distance  and  reaches  aou  there,  in  whose  brain  it 
unloads  its  store,  and  you  obtain  what  I  send.  I 
have  communicated  my  thought,  my  inmost  Self 
to  you,  and  we  can  co-operate  in  one  great  institu- 
tional whole.  I  can  represent  my  Image  of  some 
former  experience,  then  I  can  stimulate  you  to 
represent  it  through  the  Word,  so  that  you  have 
it  too.  Thus  the  most  individual  thing  in  exist- 
ence, the  Ego  itself,  breaks  over  its  barriers  and 
unites  with  other  Egos,  and  socializes  itself  by 
means  of  languao^e. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  we  come  to  see  the  chief 
purpose  and  content  of  the  Representative  Arts. 
They  are  to  reproduce  and  to  keep  perpetually 
active  the  institutional  Self  through  the  Word. 
As  the  simple  Word  in  its  birth  associates  men 
together,  so  the  organized  Word  will  represent 
and  put  into  largo  Images  the  most  complex 
social  relations,  showing  the  manifold  conflicts 
and  harmonies  of  the  institutional  world.  Large 
Images  we  may  call  great  poems,  like  the  epics 
of  Homer,  or  the  dramas  of  Shakespeare. 

So  much  for  the  Image,  the  Symbol,  and  the 
Word,  which  cannot  be  here  developed  further. 


580  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

The  reader  who  is  desirous  of  seeing  a  fuller 
treatment  can  find  it  in  the  text-books  on  Psy- 
chology (the  author's  view  of  Representation 
is  given  in  his  Psychology  and  the  Psychosis, 
p.  222 ;  an  account  of  the  artistic  Symbol  is 
found  on  p.  297-343 ;  the  Word  as  universal 
Sign,  p.  364—377). 

The  Representative  Arts  may  include  what  is 
usually  called  Literature,  the  Arts  of  the  Word. 
Literature  has  its  implicit  stage,  when  it  is 
hardly  more  than  the  germ  or  cell  out  of  which 
the  many  forms  of  literary  composition  develop. 
This  primal  stage  is  the  Myth  us  or  Folk-lore, 
which  becomes  more  fully  explicit  in  Belles- 
Lettres,  under  which  term  we  place  the  vast 
quantity  of  products  written  with  more  or  less 
literary  art,  belonging  to  certain  ages  and 
nations,  and  then  sinking  out  of  the  view  of  all 
except  scholars  and  specialists.  But  finally  this 
multiplicity  of  literatures  unifies  itself  in  the 
Bibles  of  the  world,  which  show  a  permanent 
element  belonginof  to  no  other  books,  beino:  the 
eternal  record  of  what  is  eternal.  A  few  ob- 
servations we  shall  make  upon  each  of  these 
stages. 

I.  Mythology.  Inthe  Eepresentative  Arts  the 
first  place  is  to  be  assigned  to  the  Mythus,  as  the 
primal  unlettered  literature  of  the  folk,  embrac- 
ing the  popular  tale,  legend,  song,  which  exist 
long  before  writing.     This  sphere  has  recently 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  581 

received  the  name  Folk-lore^  the  lore  or  learning 
of  the  people,  which  term  indicates  its  educative 
character. 

The  Mjthus  even  of  the  savage  deals  with  the 
deepest  matters  —  the  God,  the  Hero,  the  cre- 
ation of  the  world  and  its  government.  Primor- 
diallv  it  is  transmitted  bv  tradition  from  genera- 
tion  to  generation,  and  is  a  kind  of  school,  in 
which  young  and  old  receive  their  training  to 
the  institutional  order,  however  primitive  this 
may  be.  The  bard,  who  recounts  the  deeds  of 
the  aforetime,  is  really  the  teacher  of  his  tribe, 
and  must  be  regarded  as  a  member  of  the  Edu- 
cative Institution.  A  collection  of  Greek  folk- 
tales, united  into  an  organic  Whole  by  a  mighty 
poetic  genius,  is  the  Odyssey,  probably  the 
greatest  and  most  influential  educational  book  of 
the  Occident. 

So  important  are  these  folk-tales  for  the  edu- 
cation of  the  child  that  they  have  been  in  recent 
years  assigned  a  place  in  the  instruction  of  the 
School.  The  teacher,  particularly  of  young 
children,  must  still  be  a  sort  of  bard  or  skald, 
with  memory  full  of  folk-lore  adapted  to  his  or 
her  infant  audience. 

The  Mythus  (or  Folk-lore)  is  the  natural  lit- 
erature of  the  race  in  its  infancy.  But  from 
this  first  rude  expression  there  begins  soon  to 
unfold  the  literature  of  culture,  whose  supreme 
function  i.s  to  reflect  the  advance  in  institutions, 


582  SOCIAL  mSTITUTIONS. 

or,  as  we  often  say,  the  progress  of  civilization. 
When  the  poet  (poiete.s,  the  maker)  begins  to 
show  a  consciousness  of  his  process,  and  is  able 
to  plan  and  to  build  a  poetic  edifice,  he  has  re- 
vealed a  new  stage  of  Eepresentative  Art;  he 
brings  before  us  not  one  little  image  of  some  per- 
son or  event,  but  one  colossal  Image  of  an  action 
and  its  hero  (like  the  Iliad).  Yet  this  single 
panoramic  Image  is  evolved  out  of  the  Mythus 
of  previous  ages. 

II.  Belles- Lettren.  Thus  we  have  to  resort  to 
the  French  for  a  term  needed  in  English  and  not 
unfamiliar  to  our  tongue.  The  German  word 
Diclitung  would  better  serve  our  purpose,  but  it 
is  wholly  alien.  Its  nearest  English  equivalent, 
Fiction,  is  a  subordinate  branch  of  Belles-Lettres, 
which  last  term  may  be  considered  as  embracing 
the  literature  of  culture,  though  in  general  all 
literature,  even  the  rudest,  is  educative. 

Under  this  head  the  first  great  movement  is  to 
transfigure  the  positive  Mj^thus  (or  Folk-lore) 
into  the  artistic  poem,  which  thereby  obtains  a 
new  and  more  complete  form,  wnth  a  fresh  mean- 
ing derived  from  its  institutional  environment. 
Still  such  a  poem  is  to  keep  its  first  s})ontaneous 
breath  of  Nature,  which  belono-s  to  the  imnie- 
diate  utterance  of  the  people.  Many  recent 
ballads  of  civilization,  though  derived  from  an 
old  savage  song  or  tale,  show  in  a  striking  way 
this   transfiguration.     Herein    Goethe   has    fur- 


THE  ED  UCA  TIVE  INS TITUTION.  583  ■ 

nished  the  best  examples  in  his  ballads,  which  are 
usually  snatches  of  old  folk-songs  or  tales  wrought 
over  into  exquisite  Art. 

The  first  literature  of  a  people  is  poetic,  though 
rudely  so.  But  with  literary  culture  conies  the 
separation  into  poetry  and  prose,  which  of  course 
takes  place  gradually.  Social  life  as  it  advances, 
develops  the  very  important  side  of  utility,  and 
at  the  same  time  calls  forth  a  literature  of  utility, 
which  can  only  be  prose.  Finally  this  prosaic 
Word  will  multiply  itself  into  infinity  (in  the 
newspaper,  magazine,  etc.),  and  will  overwhelm 
and  discredit  poetry  and  the  poetic  view  of  the 
world.  Still  the  latter  will  assert  itself  even  in 
prose,  and  in  the  modern  novel  will  conquer  a 
new  spiritual  domain  for  itself  as  the  expression 
and  reflection  of  the  institutional  world. 

In  the  third  place,  the  diversified  poetic  and 
prosaic  literary  elements  of  a  people  and  of  an 
age  will  show  a  movement  of  unification  which  is 
seen  in  certain  literary  wholes,  as  in  national 
literatures  belouging  to  given  peoples  (as  Greek, 
Latin,  Italian,  etc.);  also  in  epochal  literatures 
belonging  to  given  epochs  (as  the  Renascence, 
the  Romantic  Movement,  etc.);  finally  in  what 
has  been  called  world-literature  or  the  universal 
sweep  in  all  literatures,  through  the  ages,  reveal- 
ing ultimately  the  one  spirit  which  is  that  of 
Institutions. 

r>ut  even  this  world-literature,  being  a  contin- 


584  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

uous  stream  coming  down  the  ages,  and  made  up 
of  many  writings  or  books  of  varied  excellence, 
must  at  a  pivotal  period  in  some  world-bearing 
nation,  gather  itself  up  in  one  great  book,  the 
concentrated  essence  of  all  lesser  books,  a  Book 
so  great  that  it  must  be  given  a  new  name  and 
considered  in  a  class  by  itself.  Thus  world-lit- 
erature issues  in  a  World-Book,  or  line  of  \A''orld- 
Books. 

III.  Bibles.  These,  as  already  stated,  divide 
themselves  into  two  kinds,  the  religious  and  the 
secular,  or  Asiatic  and  European.  In  them  all 
we  behold  some  form  of  the  Mj^thus,  or  Folk- 
lore transfigured  into  the  expression  of  the  high- 
est verities.  Thus  they  go  back  to  the  primor- 
dial roots  of  man's  utterance  of  his  own  and  the 
Divine  Self,  of  his  relation  to  the  spiritual  or 
institutional  world  encompassing  him,  and  secur- 
ing to  him  all  his  worth,  inner  and  outer. 

Asia  is  the  creative  home  of  religion  and  the 
relififious  Bibles.  The  latter  are  now  beino^  trans- 
lated  into  English  and  collected  into  a  huge 
library  called  "  Sacred  Books  of  the  East." 
For  our  present  purpose  we  may  throw  them  into 
two  groups.  There  is,  first,  the  Bibles  of  Central 
and  Eastern  Asia,  those  of  India,  Persia,  China. 
These  have  been  formed  quite  independently  of 
the  Occident.  But  the  Bibles  of  Western  Asia, 
all  of  them  Semitic,  have  been  developed  partially 
or  wholly  in  contact  with    the   West.     One  of 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  585 

them,  the  Christian  New  Testament,  is  the 
adopted  religious  Bible  of  Europe. 

But  Europe  has  shown  its  creative  power  in 
literature  through  its  secular  or  literary  Bibles. 
These  are  the  supreme  intellectual  products  of 
the  West-Aryan  race,  and  set  forth  its  institu- 
tional world  in  the  highest  forms  of  Representa- 
tive Art,  which  culminates  just  in  them.  More- 
over these  World-Books  are  in  their  last  purpose 
educative  and  must  be  ranged  under  the  Educa- 
tive Institution,  in  which  they  are  always  to  lind 
their  place ;  in  fact,  they  have  been  the  chief 
educators  of  humanity,  especially  in  that  School 
which  we  have  called  the  Universal  Institute  or 
the  School  of  Civilization. 

Such  is  the  place  to  which  Ave  assign,  in  the 
institutional  order,  the  Literary  Bibles  of  the 
Occident. 

I  shall  not  here  give  any  extended  account  of 
these  Literary  Bibles,  and  of  the  Representative 
Arts,  since  I  have  treated  of  them  quite  fully  in 
another  work  (Commentary  on  the  Literary 
Bibles — Homer,  Dante,  Shakespeare,  Goethe), 
to  which  I  have  devoted  many  years  of  the  best 
portion  of  my  life.  It  will  be  sufficient  here  to 
make  this  general  reference  to  that  work  for  the 
reader  who  wishes  to  pursue  his  studies  farther 
along  this  line. 


586  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 


III.  The  Noetic  Arts. 


It  was  the  old  Greek  philosopher  Anaxagoras 
who  first  declared  that  JTous  (Mind,  Reason, 
Thought)  was  the  source  of  all  things,  the  gen- 
erative principle  of  the  universe.  "With  this  word 
J^oiis  so  decisively  uttered,  Philosophy  or  the 
thinking  science  may  be  said  to  have  made  its 
real  beginning.  Aristotle,  alluding  to  this  epoch- 
makino-  word  of  Anaxagoras,  declares  that  the 
latter  appeared  by  such  a  statement  like  a  sober 
man  amono-  a  lot  of  drunken  men. 

Accordingly  a  derivative  from  this  first  Greek 
word  of  philosophy  may  be  properly  applied  to 
the  present  sphere  in  which  Thought  undertakes 
to  seize  and  to  express  Thought  in  Nature,  Man, 
and  Institutions.  Hence  the  name  N^oetic,  in 
contrast  to  the  preceding  Presentative  and  Imag- 
inative Arts. 

Thought  now,  in  grasping  and  uttering  the 
principle  of  the  world,  emploj's  its  own  form, 
not  that  of  sense  or  of  image,  but  that  of  thought. 
We  call  it  an  Art,  inasmuch  as  it  has  the  element 
of  Will,  and  expresses  itself  in  an  external  form, 
which  reveals  the  absolute  mind  to  others,  as  in 
the  previous  Arts. 

Yet  we  have  here  also  mind  or  thought  {^Xous) 
present  in  the  utterance,  and  so  the  two  are  put 
together  in  the  expression :  Noetic  Arts,  which 
signifv,  in  oenernl,  the  Tliouaht-Arts. 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  587 

The  Noetic  Arts  we  place  iii  the  Universal 
Educative  Institution,  to  which  fact  let  us  give  a 
moment's  attention.  We  shall  find  these  Arts 
to  be  institutional,  to  be  a  phase  of  actualized 
Free-Will  w^hose  end  is  Free- Will.  Also  they 
are  educative,  seeking  to  reproduce  the  world  of 
social  Institutions  in  the  human  Ego,  so  that 
they  become  the  content  of  its  actions.  More- 
over they  belong  to  the  Universal  or  Absolute 
Educative  Institution,  which  is  the  School  of  Life 
or  the  University  of  Civilization,  whose  teacher 
is  ultimately  the  World-Spirit. 

The  Noetic  Arts  then  —  which  are  Natural 
Science,  History  and  Philosophy  —  are  a  part  of 
the  course  of  training  in  the  Universal  Institute 
already  mentioned.  They  have  their  text-books, 
written  by  their  great  men,  who  are  the  creative 
spirits  of  these  Arts. 

It  should  be  observed  that  the  Noetic  Arts 
have  quite  as  much  Science  in  them  as  Art,  and 
they  may  be  called  Sciences  as  well  as  Arts. 
Their  content  is  Thought  which  primarily  is  a 
form  of  knowing  or  of  Science.  Yet  this  Thought 
utters  itself  in  its  own  form,  and  so  is  practical 
or  volitional.  The  two  words  Noetic  Arts, 
show  both  elements,  Science  and  Art,  united  in 
one  expression.  Let  the  reader,  then,  not  deem 
it  an  inconsistency  when  wc  place  in  the  present 
sphere  of  Art  the  Sciences  of  Nature,  of  History, 
Mild  (jf  Philosophy,  all  of  which  have  just  the 
double  (.'hnracter  nlhidcd  to. 


588  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Noetic  Art  is,  accordingly,  Science  expressed 
in  is  own  form ;  it  is  the  expression  of  Thought 
as  the  creative  principle  of  all  things,  and  this 
expression  is  by  Thought  and  for  Thought. 
The  Noetic  act  of  mind  is  Thought  seeing  the 
world  created  b}^  Thought,  and  the  utterance 
thereof  becomes  the  Noetic  Art. 

Here  we  may  note  the  process  of  the  three 
Eo-os,  which  has  been  already  referred  to  re- 
peatedly.  First  is  the  Ego  as  creative  individual, 
the  genius,  the  discoverer;  in  the  present  field  its 
form  is  that  of  Science,  the  scientific  Ego. 
Secondly  this  Ego  finds  and  utters  the  creative 
Thought  in  Nature  and  in  Institutions,  in  the 
Universe  generally;  it  beholds  the  divinely 
creative  Ego  thinking  the  Thought  of  all  things ; 
it  sees  God  as  scientific.  Thirdly,  this  divinely 
creative  Thouo^ht  of  the  world  the  scientific  Ego 
before  mentioned  utters  in  its  own  form,  the 
scientific ;  this  utterance  is  for  the  learner,  the 
recipient  Ego,  which  is  also  to  become  scientific, 
is  to  have  the  training  and  culture  of  Science, 
and  to  share  in  the  scientific  view  of  the  world. 

Thus  the  scientific  genius  has  his  place  along 
with  the  artist  proper  and  the  poet.  Indeed  he 
may  also  be  called  an  artist,  the  Noetic  artist, 
whose  material  is  taken  not  from  the  world  of 
Sense,  or  of  Imagination,  but  of  Thought,  which 
verily  lies  behind  all  and  is  the  absolutely  gen- 
erative principle  of  all. 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  589 

Such  a  scientific  genius  is  a  great  educator  of 
his  race  —  not  the  only  one,  still  a  very  important 
and  necessary  one.  He  belongs  to  the  Universal 
Educative  Institute  of  Humanity,  and  labors 
therein  for  the  grand  ultimate  end  —  the  making 
of  a  free  man  in  a  free  world.  Artist  he  is  from 
one  point  of  view  and  Scientist  from  another ; 
but  deepest  of  all  he  is  a  Teacher.  Nor  must 
Ave  ever  forget  in  what  kind  of  a  School  he  is 
employed ;  he  may  or  may  not  be  an  instructor 
in  a  little  kindergarden  of  little  children  or  in  a 
great  university ;  it  is  all  the  same :  his  true  vo- 
cation lies  in  the  School  of  Civilization,  and  his 
ultimate  emploj^er  is  the  World-Spirit,  who,  it  is 
well  known,  often  pays  no  salary,  and  even  may 
exact  his  task  with  life-blood. 

At  this  point  we  should  take  cognizance  of  the 
fact  that  Noetic  Art  is  the  third  stage  in  the  pro- 
cess of  all  Art.  Spirit,  Mind,  Ego  has  the  three- 
fold movement  in  itself,  which  is  fully  described 
and  unfolded  in  Psychology,  called  the  Psychosis. 
Thouo;ht  is  the  third,  its  two  antecedents  being; 
Sense-perception  and  Eepresentation ;  each  of 
the  three  has  its  corresponding  Art  or  group  of 
Arts.  Now  Thought  is  a  return  to  Sense-percep- 
tion and  its  world  of  matter,  which  world,  taken 
for  granted  by  the  Senses,  Thought  must  pene- 
trate till  it  finds  itself  as  the  creative  principle 
thereof,  and  utters  the  same  in  a  Noetic  Art. 
Sense-perception  at  first  stimulates  the    artistic 


590  SOCIAL   IXSTITUTIONS. 

Ego  to  re-shape  crude  matter  into  a  divinely  cre- 
ative form,  which  still  remains  material.  But 
Thought  stimulates  the  Noetic  or  Scientific  Ego 
to  utter  the  divinely  creative  Thought  of  the 
world,  both  material  and  spiritual,  in  the  form  of 
Thought.  Thus  Thought  returns  to  the  world  of 
Sense-perception  and  makes  the  latter's  maker. 
Thereby  Art  becomes  Science  also,  and  the 
Artist  is  the  Thinker. 

The  Noetic  Art  (or  Arts)  will  also  show  the 
Psychosis,  as  they  must  reveal  the  inner  process 
of  Thought  itself  as  universal,  or  as  the  abso- 
lutely creative  Ego. 

I.  Natural  Science;  the  Ego  as  Will  (Art) 
utters  itself  in  a  Thought  (Noetic)  which  reveals 
and  expresses  the  absolute  Ego  as  the  creative 
energy  in  Nature,  hence  as  Nature-Spirit. 

The  Divine  Will  realizes  itself  in  the  phenom- 
ena of  Nature  ;  scientific  or  noetic  Thought  for- 
mulates the  energy  thus  realizing  itself,  in  the 
scientific  categories  of  Cause,  Force,  Law.  A 
world  of  Law  thus  rises  out  of  Natural  Science. 

II.  Historical  Science;  the  Ego  as  Will  (Art) 
utters  itself  in  a  Thought  (Noetic)  which  reveals 
and  expresses  the  Absolute  Ego  as  the  creative 
energy  in  human  events,  hence  as  the  world- 
historical  Spirit. 

The  Divine  Will  realizes  itself  also  in  the  phe- 
nomena of  the  individual  Human  Will,  as  it 
unfolds  in  Institutions  whose  scientific    (noetic) 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  ;>9l 

process  we  have  previously  set  forth  in  this  book. 
History  is  ultimately  the  Noetic  process  of  the 
World's  History,  which  likewise  has  its  Law  and 
its  Judgment. 

11\.  Philosophical  Science ;  the  Ego  as  Will  (  Art ) 
utters  itself  in  a  Thought  which  reveals  and  ex- 
presses the  Absolute  Ego  as  thinking  all  Thought 
or  the  Thought  of  the  Universe  —  which  expres- 
sion is  in  the  pure  terms  of  Thought,  or  in  the 
so-called  abstract  categories  of  Thinking.  Phi- 
losophy  is  not  simph^  the  Thought  of  the  object 
(as  in  Natural  Science  and  History)  but  is  the 
Thought  of  this  Tliought,  is  the  genetic  prin- 
ciple of  Thought  as  genetic,  or  is  Thought 
as    self -creative. 

Natural  Science  shows  the  Cosmos,  man  living 
in  the  World  of  Nature  governed  by  Law,  which 
Law  he  must  discover,  obey,  and  control.  His- 
torical Science  shows  Civilization,  mww  living  in 
a  world  of  Institutions  whose  Law  he  must  obey, 
employ,  and  finally  make.  Philosophical  Science 
shows  the  Universe,  man  living  in  a  world  of 
Thoughts  or  Ideas, Mhich  are  the  Law  underlying- 
all  Laws,  or  the  Principle  creative  of  all  Princi- 
ples. Thought  is,  in  general,  creative  of  the 
Thing,  but  philosophical  Thought  is  creative  of 
the  Thouoht  creative  of  the  Thing-. 

The  Divine  Will  realizes  itself  also  in  the  pro- 
cess of  Thought,  as  it  unfolds  into  the  Systems 
of  Philosophy  which  have  in  various  ages  domi- 


592  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS.' 

nated  the   "World  of   Ideas.,  the   latter  likewise 
having  its  Process. 

Science  (Natural),  History  and  Philosophy  as 
the  three  Noetic  Arts  are  seen  to  form  a  Psy- 
chosis. First  is  the  Absolute  Esfo  as  manifesting: 
itself  immediatel}^  in  Nature,  into  which  it  is,  as 
it  were,  sunk  in  a  sleep,  till  the  scientist  awakens 
it  to  consciousness.  Second  is  the  Absolute  Egfo 
manifesting  itself  as  Universal  AVill  in  the  mani- 
fold specialized  forms  of  Will  —  Individual,  Fam- 
ily, State,  etc.  Third  is  the  Absolute  Ego  mani- 
festing; itself  as  Thouolit  in  the  forms  of  Thoug-ht, 
which  is  the  creative  energy  behind  Nature  and 
History. 

Thus  the  Philosophical  Science  is  a  self -return, 
Thought  returning  upon  itself  and  thinking  itself 
as  its  own  generative  source.  Philosophy  is  the 
science  which  goes  back  to  all  the  other  sciences 
and  formulates  tlie  Thought  of  all  their  special 
Thoughts  or  Principles ;  thus  it  is  Thought  think- 
ing Thought  as  the  creative  energy  of  the 
Universe. 

Such  is,  in  general,  this  last  field  of  the  Uni- 
versal Educative  Institution,  embracing  the 
Noetic  Arts,  whose  three  divisions  are  now  to  be 
more  fully  defined. 

I.  Natural  Sciexce.  Man  finds  himself  in  an 
environment,  which  in  a  general  way  goes  under 
the  name  of  Nature.  This  environment  condi- 
tions him  on  all  sides,  determines  him  from  with- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  o93 

out,  SO  that  he  is  from  this  point  of  view  an  un- 
free  being,  just  the  opposite  of  that  which  is  his 
supreme  end,  namely  freedom. 

But  man  as  sentient,  even  as  an  animal,  reacts 
against  his  physical  environment ;  there  is  some- 
thing in  him  which  will  not  permit  him  to  be 
passively  determined  from  without.  As  he  rises 
in  the  scale  of  rationality  he  asserts  himself  more 
and  more  against  this  crushing  necessity  of  Na- 
ture, this  external  Fate.  He  investigates  the 
massive  hand  of  the  physical  universe,  to  see  if 
he  may  not  in  some  way  shun  it  or  control  it. 
Thus  he  comes  to  know  the  inner  character  of 
his  physical  environment,  and  this  knowledge 
culminates  in  Natural  Science. 

The  grand  outcome  of  Natural  Science  is  the 
discovery  and  formulation  of  the  Laws  of  Nature, 
which  must  be  finally  united  in  an  ordered  and 
complete  collection.  They,  too,  must  be  codi- 
fied, like  Statutory  Laws ;  they  constitute  a  kind 
of  Corpus  Juris  of  Nature,  which  man  must 
study  and  learn,  and  then  obey — through  which 
obedience  comes  finally  the  control  over  Nature. 
By  such  means  he  wins  his  freedom  in  his  physi- 
cal environment,  and  liberates  himself,  in  an 
ever-increasing  degree,  from  the  Fate  of  Nature. 

The  chief  fruitage  of  Natural  Science  is  the 
codification  of  the  Laws  of  Nature,  accordins:  to 
which  man  lives  a  life  of  freedom.  Here  we  may 
behold    the    institutional    element     in    Natural 

3S 


594  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Science,  we  may  see  that  it  too  has  as  its  final 
end  and  culmination  a  free  man  living  in  a  free 
Avorld,  by  knowing  and  obeying  the  Laws  of 
Nature,  and  finally  by  employing  them  to  control 
Nature.  Let  a  man  disobey  the  Law  of  Gravi- 
tation; what  is  the  consequence?  The  penalty 
of  violation  follows,  and  he  cannot  plead  igno- 
rance :   ignorantia  legis  non  excusat. 

We  have  already  noted  that  the  State  has  spe- 
cially its  Law,  whose  end  is  also  freedom.  Li- 
deed  the  Law  of  the  State  is  beginning  to  enforce 
certain  Natural  Laws,  for  instance  those  of  sani- 
tation. As  the  grand  function  of  the  State  is  to 
secure  freedom,  so  it  sometimes  has  to  re-enact 
the  Laws  of  Nature,  particularly  tlie  Laws  of 
Health. 

Thus  the  scientist  in  his  fashion  is  also  a  law- 
giver, indeed  he  is  the  most  important  of  all 
recent  legislators, —  he  Avho  is  to  discover  and 
formulate  the  Laws  of  Nature,  not  in  the  old 
sense  of  the  word  found  in  the  publicists  of  the 
last  and  preceding  centuries,  but  in  the  modern 
sense.  For  the  former  discoverer  and  formulator 
of  the  Law  of  Nature  was  still  the  lawyer,  but 
now  it  is  the  scientist  like  Darwin  with  his  Law 
of  Evolution. 

Moreover  this  Body  of  scientific  Law  is  illus- 
trated by  a  new  literature,  the  scientific,  which  is 
necessarily  educative,  its  purpose  being  to  inform 
the  people  (the  recipient  Ego)  concerning   the 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  •'!'-■"' 

Law  which  tlicy  h;ivc  to  know  and  obey  and 
finally  employ  unto  the  end  of  freedom. 

Again  we  may  come  back  to  that  thought 
which  is  the  uniting  principle  of  our  whole  work: 
Natural  Science  belongs  to  the  great  Educative 
Institution  of  Civilization  whose  end  is  institu- 
tional freedom.  Tlic  individual  must  be  in- 
structed in  the  Laws  of  Nature  in  order  to  will 
them  and  thus  be  free.  He  is  Free- Will  willing 
Free-Will  through  the  Institution  of  Natural 
Science  and  its  Law. 

Still  further,  we  have  designated  Natural  Sci- 
ence as  a  Noetic  Art;  it  utters  itself  as  Thought 
in  the  so-called  categories  of  Natural  Science,  as 
Force,  Cause,  Law.  These  abstract  terms,  by 
Avhich  the  soul  of  Nature  (or  its  Ego)  is  ex- 
pressed, can  be  grasped  only  by  Thought  as 
Thought.  Hence  it  comes  that  Natural  Science, 
in  uttering  itself,  looks  bevond  itself  to  a  Science 
of  Thought.  Or  the  Ego  of  the  scientist  must 
ultimately  behold  and  express  the  Nature-Spirit, 
or  the  absolutely  creative  Ego  of  Nature  in  the 
terms  or  language  of  the  Ego,  which  is  ultimately 
Thought.  It  is  the  poet  who  uses  the  images  of 
Nature  for  his  utterance,  not  the  scientist ;  the 
latter  seeks  to  discover  and  to  formulate  the  inner 
energizing  process  of  Nature,  wliich  can  be  done 
only  by  Thought. 

Thus  Natural  Science  has  a  continuous  outlook 
upon  Psychology   as  its  unifying  and  codifying 


596  SOCIAL  lN:sriTUT10NS. 

principle.  It  springs  from  the  individual  Ego  of 
the  scientist  identifying  and  declaring  the  process 
of  the  absolute  Ego  in  the  processes  of  Nature. 
Natural  Science  must  come  back  to  God  in  Nature 
(the  absolutely  creative  Ego)  out  of  its  skepticism 
and  agnosticism,  just  as  it  must  come  to  be  the 
grand  advocate  and  vindicator  of  Freedom  out 
of  its  Determinism.  A  Psychology  of  Nature  is 
what  will  ultimately  connect  Natural  Science  with 
other  Sciences,  all  of  which  are  now  looking  to 
Psj'chology  (to  be  sure,  the  right  Psychology) 
for  their  final  correlation. 

It  is  plain  that  Natural  Science  has  reasons  for 
being  a  part  of  every  educational  curriculum  far 
deeper  than  those  usually  assigned.  It  cultivates 
observation,  it  has  many  utilities  in  life,  it  gives 
pleasure,  etc. ;  chiefly,  however,  it  has  a  social 
and  institutional  function  by  its  training  in  the 
Laws  of  Nature,  since  it  advances  man  toward 
freedom  through  bringing  him  to  will  Free-Will 
in  the  form  of  Law. 

Moreover  Natural  Science  enables  man  not  only 
to  nuike  himself  free  but  to  make  the  world  free 
along  with  himself — otherwise  indeed  he  is  not 
free.  Rude  Nature,  man's  outer  determinant  in 
Space  and  Time,  is  transformed  through  a  knowl- 
edge of  phj'sical  Laws  into  a  realm  of  freedom, 
since  he  thereby  can  largely  control  his  environ- 
ment . 

In    looking-    into    the    movement    of    Natui*al 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  597 

Science  we  may  regard  it  from  three  points  of 
view. 

1.  The  investigators  or  the  working  body  of 
scientists  are  seeking  to  discover  primarily  the 
Facts  of  Nature,  which  mean  something  more 
than  the  mere  external  phenomena.  Water,  say, 
is  the  outer  material  phenomenon ;  investigation 
shows  that  it  is  decomposable  into  two  simple  ele- 
ments, oxygen  and  hydrogen,  which,  when  sepa- 
rated and  independent,  can  be  re-united  and  pro- 
duce water.  Such  is  the  cycle  of  the  Fact  (here 
a  chemical  one)  Avhich  is  a  Psychosis,  or  the  im- 
mediate natural  object  made  to  pass  through  the 
alembic  of  the  Ego  of  the  investigator  whose 
form  or  process  it  takes.  (1)  First  is  the  sim- 
j)le  object  of  Nature;  (2)  then  is  the  decomposi- 
tion or  separation;  (3)  finally  is  re-composition, 
the  return  to  the  first  stage  after  passing  through 
analysis.  Such  is  the  basic  chemical  process, 
yet  evidently  conforming  to  the  process  of  the 
Ego  that  it  become  Science.  Now  every  depart- 
ment of  Science,  mechanical,  physical,  or  bio- 
logical, has  a  store  of  these  Facts. 

2.  Thus,  however.  Science  is  merely  a  mass  of 
isolated  Facts,  discoveries,  experiments.  Of 
course  to  the  scientist  tliis  psychological  side  of 
his  Fact  is  unconscious.  His  mind  is  on  the 
thing  as  it  is,  and  he  turns  away  from  all  sub- 
jective suggestion.  He.  will  import  nolliing  of 
himself  into  the  F:ict,  } el  llie  only  iniplciiicnt,  of 


5!i8  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

discovering  the  Fact  is  himself,  his  Ego.  He 
must  free  himself  from  subjective  illusions, 
fancies,  caprices,  pre-conceptions ;  he  must  keep 
all  of  himself  out  of  the  Fact  except  just  his  Self. 
And  the  ultimate  thing  which  he  can  see  and  know 
in  the  Fact  is  just  Self. 

But  now  comes  a  further  analysis  of  the  Fact 
of  Nature  on  various  sides.  I  observe  a  material 
object  to  be  heavy,  it  is  seeking  unity  with  the 
earth,  yea  with  the  total  cosmos.  But  this  ap- 
petency I  separate  and  call  a  Force,  the  Force  of 
Gravitation.  So  I  find  all  Nature  to  be  full  of 
Forces  which  I  must  separate,  know  and  name  by 
themselves.  This  divisive  stage  of  Natural 
Science  thus  manifesting  itself  is  the  realm  of 
Force,  which  is  the  seeking  to  get  behind  Nature 
and  to  lind  the  primordial  Ego  (or  demiurge)  in 
his  vast  workshop  called  the  physical  Universe. 

Such  is  the  second  phase,  showing  the  separa- 
tive character  of  the  mighty  Nature-Ego  in  its 
perpetual  Process,  which  the  human  Ego  of  the 
investigator  has  to  grasp  and  utter.  Now  the 
human  Ego,  grasping  a  force  and  uttering  it,  has 
to  do  so  through  a  Psychosis,  as  follows:  (1) 
potential,  unmanifested  Force ;  (2)  Force  and  its 
manifestation,  the  twofoldness  which  is  some- 
times named  Cause  and  Effect ;  (3)  the  return  of 
Force  into  itself,  not  merely  for  once  but  con- 
tinuously—  the  doctrine  of  persistent  Force,  tlic 
cycle  of    Force  throughout  the  Universe.     But 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  699 

thereby  Force  vanishes  into  Law,  which  expresses 
a  permanent  universal  fixed  relation  or  activity  of 
Force,  as  the  Law  of  Gravitation  or  the  Law  of 
Multiple  Proportions  in  Chemistry. 

3.  Law  suggests,  therefore,  the  complete  cycle 
of  Force,  potential  and  real.  Oxygen  and  hydro- 
gen unite  to  form  water,  is  the  Fact ;  the  might 
or  energy  of  union  is  Force,  passing  from  potential 
to  real  and  back  again ;  the  method  or  measure 
of  the  uniting  Force  is  given  by  the  Law.  Law 
announces  the  universal  principle  controlling 
Force;  through  Law  (Natural)  man  can  know 
and  control  the  Forces  of  Nature. 

When  I  say  a  Law  of  Nature,  I  recognize  a 
power,  a  Will  which  controls  certain  Forces  of 
Nature,  so  that  they  act  uniformly;  the  phenom- 
ena occur  according  to  Law.  Really  Law  is  a 
form  of  Will  in  Nature,  a  manifestation  of  the 
universal  Will  working  and  creating  by  a  univer- 
sal method. 

It  is  true  that  the  scientist  does  not  recog^nize 
the  Will  in  Law  or  in  Force ;  these  are  his  final 
expressions,  for  he  is  not  psychological  in  his 
terras.  Still  he  unconsciously  presupposes  Psy- 
chology in  all  of  his  formulation.  Physical 
Science  is  the  knowing  of  Nature,  the  recognition 
of  the  Self  in  it ;  this  knowing  is  what  is  formu- 
Uited  in  Science.  The  original  naturalist  sees  in 
leality  Thought  to  bo  the  creative  power  of 
Nature,  yet  he  does   not  formulate  or  recognize 


600       ,  SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIONS. 

this  power  as  Thought.  He  must  separate  it 
from  the  Self,  and  look  at  it  as  something:  dis- 
tinct  from  the  Self,  though  it  be  just  his  Self 
which  sees  and  formulates,  and  furthermore  sees 
and  formulates  the  absolutely  creative  Self  in 
Nature,  yet  with  his  own  scientific  concepts  (such 
as  Fact,  Force,  Law). 

The  ultimate  defense  and  justification  of 
Natural  Science  is  therefore  to  be  found  in  Psy- 
chology. Its  technical  terms  must  be  at  last 
translated  into  those  of  the  Ego's  Science  which 
is  Psychology.  But  Physiological  Ps3'cholagy 
has,  unfortunately  for  itself,  reversed  this  pro- 
cess, having  sought  to  translate  the  categories 
of  true  Psychology  back  into  the  terms  of 
Natural  Science  —  which  is  a  putting  of  the  cart 
before  the  horse. 

Again  we  may  re-state  the  point  that  Natural 
Science  on  its  institutional  side  is  the  formulated 
universal  Will  as  creating  Nature,  Tvliich  uni- 
versal Will  gives  to  the  individual  Will  itself  in 
this  Science.  Here  too  the  Will  of  the  individ- 
ual is  to  will  the  Will  creative  and  universal,  then 
the  man  controls  Nature  —  controls  its  Forces  by 
finding  and  obeying  its  Laws. 

So  Phj'sical  Science  is  a  department  or  phase 
of  the  Universal  Institute  of  Civilization,  being 
that  which  makes  valid  the  individual  Will  in  the 
mastery  of  Nature.  But  the  individual  Ego  must 
know  the  Law,  must  first  recognize  and  formu- 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  601 

late  the  universal  Ego  as  the  creative  power  of 
Nature. 

The  Body  of  Scientific  Truth  is  the  totality 
which  the  Ego  as  Intellect  must  identify  and 
make  its  own,  in  order  to  re-create  Nature  after 
the  divinely  creative  Will.  This  so-called  Body 
of  Scientific  Truth  (Nature's  Corpus  Jiiris^  is 
objective,  is  an  element  of  Civilization,  through 
which  man  realizes  his  Will  in  the  control  of 
Nature.  It  is  Civilization  which  renders  valid 
the  individual  Will,  giving  to  man  first  a  reflec- 
tion of  himself  in  the  Laws  of  Nature,  and  then 
giving  him  the  power  to  control  the  same  for 
his  own  ends  which  ultimately  make  for  free- 
dom. 

For  these  reasons  we  put  Natural  Science  among 
the  Noetic  Arts  of  the  Universal  Educative  Insti- 
tution. It  is  peculiarly  the  Noetic  Art  of  to-day, 
having  in  recent  years  made  vast  strides  and 
expressed  itself  in  an  extensive  and  often  beauti- 
ful literature. 

What  next?  In  the  preceding  treatment  of 
Science  we  have  taken  for  granted  the  human  AYill 
which  has  always  been  at  work  in  the  background  ; 
l)ut  now  our  attention  is  to  be  directed  to  it  as 
directly  expressing  the  Absolute  Will.  When 
the  Fact  of  Nature  is  reduced  to  Law,  this  is 
man's  act  —  human  Will  it  is  which  discovers, 
sets  forth  and  finally  employs  this  Law.  The 
Divine,  E«io  reveals  itself  in  the  deeds  and  works 


602  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

of  all  these  separate,  particular  human  Wills, 
which  o-o  to  make  the  events  of  the  world  occurrins; 
in  Time.  Thus  Historical  Science  comes  to  view, 
which,  in  its  widest  sweep,  embraces  quite  all  the 
spiritual  products  of  man,  since  they  all  have  a 
history,  which,  however,  culminates  in  Institu- 
tions. 

II.  Historical  Science.  Herodotus,  the 
Father  of  History,  calls  his  work,  which  is 
our  lirst  and  greatest  historical  Book,  an  in- 
quiry, an  investigation.  Thus  he  is  an  inves- 
tigator of  human  Facts  or  human  events,  as 
the  scientist  is  the  investigator  of  physical  Facts. 
This  fundamental  distinction  may  be  here  noted: 
the  Facts  of  History  are  dominantly  in  Time  and 
in  the  past,  and  spring  of  the  human  wiU  as 
their  generating  source ;  the  Facts  of  Nature  are 
dominantly  in  Space  and  of  the  Present,  and 
spring  of  physical  Force. 

The  historical  Fact,  like  the  scientific,  must 
pass  through  the  alembic  of  the  investigator,  ere 
it  gets  its  character.  First  is  the  simple  human 
occurrence  as  transmitted  ;  then  it  must  be  tested 
by  the  criteria  of  the  investigator,  and  thereb}' 
determined  to  be  authentic,  credible,  historic,  or 
the  reverse.  Of  course  the  criteria  of  the  his- 
toric Fact  have  been  very  diverse  with  different 
persons  and  in  different  ages,  starting  with  the 
primal  distinction  between  My  thus  and  History. 

The  mass  of  historic  Facts  is  found  to  have  its 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  603 

Laws,  just  as  Nature,  indeed  one  great  funda- 
mental Law.  The  point  where  Historical  touches 
Natural  Science  to-day  is  the  Law  of  Evolution. 
Each  shows  the  Evolution  of  two  different 
worlds  —  Nature  and  Institutions,  each  of  which 
has  its  distinct  Laws  and  finally  an  ultimate 
common  Law. 

History  shows  the  Evolution  of  Institutions, 
how  they  overcome  the  inadequate,  negative  ele- 
ment in  man  and  in  themselves,  and  rise  more 
and  more  toward  the  ideal  end  which  is  freedom. 
This  historic  Evolution  has  been  outHned  pre- 
viously in  each  separate  Institution  (Familj-, 
Society,  etc.).  History,  therefore,  deals  with 
actualized  Free-Will,  especially  witli  the  move- 
ment of  the  State,  whose  supreme  purpose  is  to 
secure  Free-Will  consciously  through  the  Law. 
A  succession  of  forms  of  actualized  Frce-Will, 
dcA'cloping  and  advancing  toward  perfect  actual- 
ization is  the  line  of  continuity  which  History 
presents. 

There  are  tiiree  distinct  meanings  of  History 
all  of  which,  however,  belong  together. 

1st.  The  immediate  historic  act  or  occurrence ; 
the  body  of  human  events  wliich  are  now  taking 
phice,  of  course  through  man's  Will.  Tlie  ex- 
pression which  has  been  often  heard  at  critical 
moments:  "  AYe  are  now  making  History,"'  is 
an  instance  of  the  present  meaning. 

2n(l.   Tli(^  rccoi'd  of  cv(!nts  is  also  HistorN',  usn- 


604  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

ally  written.  But  this  record  must  have  one 
additional  element :  the  Ego  of  the  recorder,  in- 
vestigator, historian,  who  may  add  reflection, 
instruction,  order  and  color  of  his  own  —  must  do 
so  more  or  less.  However  objective  he  be,  or 
thinks  himself  to  be,  he  must  at  least  test  the 
transmitted  fact  by  his  own  criteria,  apply  them, 
rejecting  or  accepting.  This  we  may  call  in 
general  historiography. 

3rd.  But  the  third  meaning  is  the  deepest  and 
most  important,  namely  Histor\^  as  historical 
Science,  and  a  Noetic  Art.  Thus  History  reveals 
the  absolute  JVous  or  Ego  in  the  movement  of 
human  events,  often  called  the  World-Spirit. 

Such  are  three  meanings  of  Histor\%  yet  at 
bottom  one,  for  they  belong  together  and  form 
a  process,  which  is  the  Psychosis.  The  third 
meaning  must  go  back  to  the  first,  the  immediate 
historic  event,  and  fill  the  same  with  the  purpose 
and  scope  of  the  Absolute  Spirit,  whose  outer 
garment  is  Time  and  its  fleeting  occurrences. 
This  is  accomplished  through  the  record  of 
events,  the  second  stage  of  History,  which  has 
made  permanent  the  grand  continuity  of  the 
historic  world. 

The  true  historic  genius  has  all  three  senses  of 
History  in  himself  as  he  investigates  and  sets 
down  the  account  of  the  ages.  He  litis  a  profound 
sense  of  the  reality,  of  the  fact  as  fact;  also  the 
industrA'  and   sobrietv  (jf   the    invostiffator,   w  lio 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  005 

tests  the  transmitted  events  hy  the  historic  sttind- 
ard  of  truth;  tiualh'  ho  must  have  a  sense  of  the 
eternal  presence  of  the  universal  Ego,  of  the 
World-Spirit,  in  the  events  which  he  records, 
and  which  are  to  reveal  the  workings  of  the 
Divine  Self  in  the  occurrences  of  Time,  as  well  as 
to  indicate  suggestively  the  final  end  of  all  His- 
tory. To  be  sure,  the  historian  as  such  is  not 
to  unfold  explicitly  the  Science  of  History  in  his 
narrative,  still  it  is  to  be  given  there  implicitly. 
Herein  again,  the  Father  of  History,  and  still 
the  first  Historian  in  excellence,  as  well  as  in 
time,  furnishes  the  best  example  to  his  succes- 
sors, though  his  criteria  often  need  revision. 

Historical  Science  takes,  then,  the  transmitted 
human  events  and  the  past  environment  of  man, 
and  transmutes  the  whole  into  Thought  whose 
culmination  is  Law,  not  natural,  but  institutional, 
which  man  must  obey  in  order  to  be  free.  More- 
over he  is  to  know  the  Law,  the  Law  of  the 
State  and  Church,  and  finally  the  Law  of  the 
World-Spirit,  whose  end  is  actualized  freedom. 
Thus  Historical  Science  is  a  part  or  branch  of 
the  Universal  Educative  Institution  (School  of 
Civilization)  which  has  to  impart  to  all  people 
(the  recipient  Egos)  the  grand  Evolution  of  the 
absolute  Nous  in  human  events,  of  which  they 
become  conscious  as  of  the  Spirit  unfolding  in 
Time.  So  our  universal  Institute  demands  His- 
torical   Science,  that    all   become    aware  of   the 


60G  SOCIAL  INSTTTUTIOYS. 

World's  History  as  revealed  in  the  individual  and 
in  the  social  order. 

Moreover,  we  can  see  that  it  belongs  to  the 
second  or  separative  stage  of  Noetic  Art,  on  ac- 
count of  the  twofoldness  of  Will :  the  Absolute 
Will  on  the  one  hand  and  on  the  other  the  Indi- 
vidual Will  with  its  Institutions,  both  sides  will- 
ing and  actualizing  freedom.  Moreover  there  is 
in  History  the  dualism  of  Present  and  Past. 

We  can  also  see  that  the  Evolution  implicit  in 
Natural  Science  (and  hence  so  late  in  being 
brought  fully  to  light)  is  explicit  in  Histor3% 
which  has  throug^h  its  being;  in  the  succession  of 
Time  the  outer  form  of  Evolution,  which  Nature 
has  not.  The  recorded  History  of  physical  man 
unfolding  through  many  forms  during  untold 
ages  is  Darwin's  recent  contribution.  But  the 
recorded  history  of  spiritual  man  unfolding  into 
and  through  Institutions,  is  older,  its  first  com- 
plete form  being  found  in  Herodotus,  who  brings 
it  very  strikingly  to  the  consciousness  of  the  Race. 
History  we  may  in  a  sense  call  the  Evolution  of 
Evolution  ;  it  is  a  continuous  outward  unfolding  in 
Time  of  the  Spirit  unfolding  inward.  Time  gives 
form  to  Histor}',  not  to  Nature,  at  least  not 
directly,  for  Nature  is  not  self-conscious  and  can- 
not record  her  own  events,  as  does  man. 

Most  important,  therefore,  is  the  study  of 
History  in  the  School  of  Civilization,  which, 
thereby,   beholds  itself  in  its    own  development 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  C07 

and  ill  its  ultimate  }nir})oso.  But  the  .study  of 
History  belongs  also  to  the  other  Schools,  to  the 
Public  School  and  to  the  University,  though  these 
do  not  create  History,  as  Civilization  does. 

These  statements  concerning  Historical  Science 
must  suffice  for  the  present.  We  have  observed 
that  Thought  is  present  as  the  divinely  creative 
principle  in  human  events,  or  in  the  deeds  of  in- 
dividuals;  next  we  are  to  see  Thought  in  the 
third  stage  of  the  present  process. 

HI.  PiiiLOSormcAL  Sciexce.  This,  in  gen- 
eral, grasps  and  formulates  Thought  :is  the 
creative  principle  of  the  Universe.  Already  in 
the  sciences  of  Nature  and  Histor}',  we  have  seen 
Thought  grasping  and  formulating  itself  as  the 
creative  principle  of  the  object  or  special  thing. 
But  in  Philosoph}^  Thought  must  grasp  and 
formulate  Thought  not  only  as  the  creative  prin- 
ciple of  the  thing  or  of  some  single  domain,  l>ut 
of  all  things,  of  the  total  Universe,  which  is 
itself  a  Thought. 

Philosophy  is  not  simplj^  Thought,  but  the 
Thought  of  Thought,  that  is.  Thought  turning- 
back  upon  itself,  and  grasping  and  formulating 
itself  as  the  pure  process  of  all  special  Sciences, 
each  of  which  has  its  own  special  Thought.  For 
instance,  Natural  Science  may  predicate  the 
Thought  of  Nature  to  be  Force,  wdiich  is  one  of 
its  terms.  But  Force,  though  a  Thought,  is 
finally  to  be  translated  into  a  term  of  Thought 


608  SOCIAL  INSTJTUriONS. 

purely,  whereby  it  is  taken  up  into  philosophi- 
cal Science.  Each  special  Science  has  its  own 
categories  applicable  to  that  Science  which  the 
investigator  has  discovered  and  employed. 
Philosophy  is  to  recognize  these  special  cate- 
gories as  Thought,  is  to  formulate  them  anew, 
and  order  them  in  a  universal  Sj^stem  of  Thought, 
showing  that  Thought  which  thinks  all  Thought 

Herein  we  can  see  the  following  process : 
First  is  Thought  expressed  immediately,  in  the 
object  of  Art  or  in  the  event  of  History.  Sec- 
ondly, the  specialist  as  thinker  or  investigator 
separates  this  implicit  Thought  in  the  Thing,  and 
utters  it  in  a  cate^orv  or  scientific  term  belonging 
specially  to  that  science.  Thirdly,  Thought  takes 
up  all  these  special  categories  or  Thoughts,  for- 
mulates and  utters  them  anew  in  one  universal 
Thought  which  is  the  creative  principle  underly- 
ing all  of  them,  thereby  calling  forth  Philoso- 
phy, which  is  hence  often  named  scientia  scien- 
tiarum. 

Philosophy  thus  proclaims  itself  as  the  primal 
principle  or  process  or  Law  ruling,  directing, 
creating  the  Universe.  Mighty  is  the  claim, 
Thought  is  not  only  absolute,  but  is  the  absolut- 
ist, being  Ego,  personal.  The  philosophic  Ego 
not  only  utters  the  Law,  which  rules,  but  the  Law 
of  Laws  in  Nature  and  History ;  his  Ego  is  not 
merely  Law-giving  but  Law-creating,  setting 
forth  that  Law  which  produces  all  other  Laws. 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  009 

And  this  universally  creative  Law  is  not  only  to 
be  obeyed  by  the  recipient  Ego,  but  is  to  be  re- 
created, if  it  be  truly  understood  and  followed. 

We  may  now  see  that  Philosophy  is  the  Noetic 
Art  par  excellence,  showing  Thought  (N^ous) 
creating  Thought  and  ordering  it  into  a  System 
or  World  of  Ideas,  which  is  to  rule  all  other 
worlds.  It  is  also  an  Institution,  being  actualized 
Will  and  educative  likewise,  since  it  is  a  discipline 
which  trains  men  in  the  School  of  Civilization  for 
freedom.  Thus  Philosophy  belongs  to  the  Uni- 
versal Educative  Institution. 

Philosophic  Science  is  the  third  stage  of  the 
total  scientific  process,  since  it  grasps  and  for- 
mulates the  return  of  Thought  upon  itself.  But 
herewith  comes  the  conclusion  of  the  Noetic  Arts, 
indeed  of  the  w^hole  w^orld  of  Institutions,  which 
has  now  brought  forth  an  Institution  knowing 
and  uttering  and  imparting  the  creative  principle 
and  source  of  all  Institutions.  Self-conscious  the 
institutional  world  has  become  in  Philosophy, 
knowingly  recreative  of  itself. 

A  new  environing  world  of  its  own  forms  Phi- 
losophy has  created,  and  into  this  hitherto  un- 
discovered or  even  non-existent  world  it  conducts 
the  Ego,  as  into  a  second  realm  of  Nature.  Still 
these  forms  are  not  real,  but  Thoughts,  Shapes, 
Schemes  of  Mind,  nevertheless  they  dominate 
the  world  of  Nature,  are  its  essences,  when  rightly 
grasped.     Of  course    the  shapes    of  Nature  are 

39 


610  >SOCIAL  IXSTITUTIONS. 

given  to  the  recipient  Ego  and  determine  it 
from  the  outside,  but  the  Ego's  grand  destiny  is 
to  create  its  own  world  of  shapes,  that  it  be  free. 
Yet  in  another  and  deeper  sense  this  Thought- 
world  is  the  true,  indeed  the  only  reality,  while 
the  material  world  of  Nature  is  the  unreal,  the 
Appearance,  fleeting,  shadowy,  lying.  For 
Thought  is  the  creative  principle  behind  all  things 
which  come  and  go,  while  this  creative  energy 
remains  and  is  eternal.  An  organized  system  of 
Thought  is  the  work  of  Philosophic  Science, 
which  first  explains  the  Universe  immediately, 
then  explains  all  other  explanations  thereof,  and 
finall}'  explains  itself,  that  is,  explains  its  own 
explanation. 

Yet  Philosophy  which  unfolds  the  system  of 
Thought,  which  unifies  and  interprets  all,  has  not 
been  one  itself  or  at  one  with  itself.  It  also 
drops  back  into  History  and  produces  in  Time  a 
succession  of  systems,  a  row  of  ideal  Worlds  down 
the  ages,  which  is  recorded  in  the  History  of 
Philosophy,  and  which,  in  any  complete  sense, 
opens  with  the  realm  of  Ideas  of  Plato  and  reaches 
down  to  the  evolution  of  loo:ical  Cateorories  in 
Hegel,  but  does  not  end  with  the  latter.  Histo- 
rical Science  or  the  Philosophy  of  History  has  its 
counterpart  in  the  History  of  Philosophy,  or 
grand  succession  not  of  events  but  of  kingdoms  of 
Ideas,  of  Categories,  of  Pure  Thought,  which 
have,  like  the  outer  kinffdoms  of  the  world,  risen, 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  611 

flourished,  and  decayed.  So  Philosophy,  grasp- 
ing and  formulating  the  Evolution  of  the  Ages  in 
Thought  is  itself  an  Evolution,  and  becomes  the 
thing  which  it  explains.  We  may  call  it  too  the 
Evolution  of  Evolution,  and  it  is  in  a  sense;  still 
even  this  does  not  rescue  it  from  the  negative  side 
of  the  evolutionary  process. 

Moreover  Philosophy  is  the  universal  Science 
(scientia  scientiarum),  yet  just  this  distinguishes 
it  from  other  sciences  and  thus  makes  it  also 
special.  So  Philosophy  develops  within  itself  a 
fundamental  contradiction :  as  including  all  dis- 
ciplines it  is  universal,  as  distinct  from  all  it  is 
special.  Indeed  its  universal  attribute,  the  fact 
that  it  is  universal,  is  just  what  specializes  it,  and 
finitizes  its  infinite  pretension. 

This  is  the  contradiction  of  which  Philosophy 
usually  dies  or  is  in  danger  of  dying.  It  unites 
the  special  and  general  in  one  process  and  so 
lives  tiU  these  two  sides  become  separated  and 
mutually  destructive.  Philosophy  should  trans- 
form the  Ego  into  creative  freedom  through  its 
absolute  Law  or  universal  Principle ;  but  it  usu- 
ally falls  to  doing  just  the  opposite :  to  tyran- 
nizing over  the  Ego  by  its  System,  and  thus 
enslaves  or  destroys  what  is  really  its  vital  foun- 
tain-head, namely,  the  Ego.  Thus  Philosophy 
drops  into  a  self -destroying  dualism,  and  undoes 
itself  by  doing  that  which  it  was  intended  to  pre- 
vent. 


612  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Herein,  however,  Philosophy  as  such  has 
reached  its  end.  It  has  asserted  itself,  asserted 
its  forms  as  the  creative  and  hence  dominating 
principle  of  all  things,  of  the  Universe.  But  its 
authority,  its  Law  and  its  Forms,  have  to  go 
back  to  the  Ego  and  be  re-created  in  conscious- 
ness, in  every  consciousness,  ere  they  can  be 
accepted.  So  a  new  Science,  or  Science  of 
Sciences,  begins  to  make  its  appearance.  Phi- 
losophy calls  for  Psychology,  or  rather  the  subor- 
dinate Philosophy  of  Psychology  passes  over 
into  the  regnant  Psychology  of  Philosophy. 

Philosophy  has  sought  and  formulated  the 
common  principle  in  all  abstractions,  trying  to 
give  their  creative  thought,  yet  in  this  act  of 
vivifying  all  abstraction  it  has  remained  abstract. 
It  has  endeavored  to  give  the  universal  element 
in  all  particulars,  still  just  therein  it  has  become 
particular  itself.  Its  ultimate  end  is  or  ought  to 
be  freedom  of  the  spirit,  but  it  turns  to  be  the 
veriest  absolutist  of  the  kingdom  of  the  mind. 
After  all.  Philosophy  is  the  absolute  Monarchy, 
not  the  Republic. 

Philosophy  must  be  absolute,  as  giving  the 
process  of  the  absolute,  or  divinely  creative  Ego 
in  the  Universe ;  but  this  absoluteness  (a  right 
thing)  has  always  dropped  into  absolutism  (a 
wrong  thing).  It  has  been  noted  by  Cicero  and 
cited  with  approval  by  Hegel  that  Philosophy  is 
suspected  and  hated  by  the  multitude,  that  is,  by 


THE  EDUCATIVE  INSTITUTION.  613 

the  people.  They  do  not  understand  it,  still 
they  dislike  it,  not  without  some  reason,  one  may 
think.  Socrates,  Plato  and  Aristotle  were  hostile 
to  the  Democracy;  rightly  so  in  part,  as  they 
knew  that  popular  caprice  is  not  freedom . 

But  absolutism  in  its  turn  is  not  freedom ;  it 
must  go  back  and  be  creatively  united  with  the 
individual  Ego  so  that  freedom  be  just  the  Abso- 
lute, not  absolutist  on  the  one  hand  nor  capricious 
on  the  other.  Individuality,  like  absoluteness,  is 
right — individualism,  like  absolutism  is  wrong. 
Thought  must,  therefore,  pass  out  from  being 
philosophical  to  being  psychological;  the  act  of 
obedience  must  imply  the  Ego's  recreation  of  the 
Law,  not  merely  subjection  to  external  authority. 

Philosophy  begins  to  apply  its  categories  to 
other  sciences  and  in  fact  to  all  domains  exter- 
nally, and  thus  loses  its  true  vital  relation  to  man 
and  to  science.  Properly  its  function  is  to 
express  the  absolutely  creative  principle  in  all 
things  by  such  categories.  So  it  comes  that 
Philosophy  drops  into  formalism  and  is  choked 
to  death  by  its  own  nomenclature. 

At  this  point  begins  the  protest  of  the  Ego 
which  ends  in  open  revolt  against  the  realm  of 
Ideas  or  Thought-forms  imposed  on  it  from  the 
outside,  without  its  acceptance  or  even  knowl- 
edge. So  it  returns  into  itself  and  asserts  its 
own  inner  movement  as  the  source  of  all  Science, 
and  specially  of  Philosophy.     Furthermore,  the 


614  SOCIAL  INSTITUTIONS. 

Ego  affirms  its  process  to  be  ultimately  one  with 
the  process  of  the  absolute  Ego,  the  creative 
source  of  Philosophy,  and  it  begins  to  insist  that 
all  categories  of  Philosophy  must  not  be  sepa- 
rated from  itself,  the  fountain-head,  but  must 
perpetually  be  brought  back  to  itself  as  their 
original  source.  Now  the  process  of  the  Ego 
Avorking  through  and  organizing  all  Philosophy  is 
the  Psychosis,  whose  unfolding  is  given  in  the 
Psychology  of  the  Intellect,  into  which  we  here 
pass  out  of  the  Psychology  of  the  Will.  We 
have  seen  the  Psychosis  as  the  genetic  and  order- 
ing principle  of  Institutions  and  of  the  entire 
realm  of  Will ;  wherewith  the  present  work  con- 
cludes itself.  Still  we  may  add  that  the  Psycho- 
sis, having  revealed  the  practical  objective  world, 
must  next  proceed  to  reveal  the  intellectual,  sub- 
jective world,  which  culminates  in  completed 
self -revelation,  or  the  Psychosis  of  the  Psychosis 
(See  Psychology  and  the  Psychosis,  p.  553,  et 
seqq.) 

Thus  the  explication  of  Philosophy  as  the  final 
Noetic  Art  calls  for  the  Psychosis,  which  has  its 
full  development  in  the  sphere  of  Intellect,  where 
it  shows  itself  as  the  immanent  creative  source  of 
all  things,  hence  too  of  Philosophy.  The  Psy- 
chosis will,  accordingly,  return  to  Philosophy 
and  all  the  systems  thereof,  and  reveal  itself  as 
their  fundamental  genetic  process  and  end. 

Philosophy    has    been   essentially  a  European 


THE  EDUCAriVE  INSTITUTION.  615 

discipline,  having  its  first  independent  movement 
in  ancient  Greece  and  its  last  in  modern  Ger- 
many. It  spans  the  whole  European  thought- 
world,  making  it  distinct  from  the  Oriental ;  but 
a  [new  discipline  is  dawning,  the  Occidental  one, 
which  is  not  philosophical  but  psychological,  and 
which  must  be  seen  to  be  the  outcome  and  the 
explanation  of  both  the  Oriental  and  the  Euro- 
pean forms  of  Thinking,  being  the  third  stage  of 
a  vast  World-Psychosis,  which  is  to  reveal  the 
triune  movement  of  Orient,  Europe,  and  Occi- 
dent. 


WORKS  BY  DENTON  J.  SNIDER 

PHBLISHED   BY 

SIGMA  PUBLISHING  COMPAlSrY, 

10  Van  Buren  Street,  Chicago,  III. 


2. 


II. 


Commentary  on  the  Literary  Bibles,  in  9  vols 
1.  Shakespeare's  Dramas,  3  vols. 
Tragedies  (new  edition),     . 
Comedies  (new  edition),     . 
Histories  (new  edition),     . 
Goethe's  Faust. 
First  Part  (new  edition),     . 
Second  Part  (new  edition), 
Homer's  Iliad  (new  edition), 

'•'        Odyssey, 
Dante's    Inferno, 

''  Purgatory  and  Paradise, 

Poems  —  in  5  vols. 

1.  Homer  in  Chios,     . 

2.  Delphic  Days, 

3.  Agamemnon's  Daughter, 

4.  Prorsus  Retrorsus, 

5.  Johnny  Appleseed's  Rhymes, 
Psychology. 

1.  Psychology  and  the  Psychosis, 

2.  The  Will  and  its  World, 

3.  Social  Institutions, 

IV.  Kindergarden. 

1.  Commentary  on  Froebel's  Mother  Play-Songs, 

2.  The  Psychology  of  Froebel's  Play-Gifts,      . 

3.  The  Life  of  Frederick  Froebel,    . 

V.  Miscellaneous. 

1.  A  Walk  in  Hellas, 

2.  The   Freeburgers   (a  novel), 

3.  World's   Fair   Studies,  .... 

4.  The  Father  of  History  (Herodotus,  in  preparation). 
Works  BY  Elizabeth  Harrison: 

1.  In   Storyland, 1.26 

2.  Two  Children  of  the  Foothills,     .        .  1.25 
For  sale  by  A.  C.  M'Clurg  &  Co.,  Booksellers,  Chicago, Ills., 

to  whom  the  trade  is  referred. 


III. 


fl.50 
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1.25 
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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


Mi 


NOV  1 7  198b 
N0V24  3B6 


30m-7/68(J1895s4) — C-120 


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